Which linux distro ?

[Adave]

Hi, I'm looking for a lightweight linux distro for my vostro 3450. I need it primarily for school, so it should last long on battery (have power management for example). The thing is i recently tried ubuntu and it nearly fryied my dear laptop, i'm kind of scared of installing another linux again. Could I get any suggestions about how to and which distro to try next ?

[Bill]

How could Ubuntu posibly have nearly fryied your laptop? Was it a power management thing?

Anyway, your are going to get a hundred different answers. Without looking up the specs on your laptop, if the computer belonged to me, I would give Fuduntu a try. It has worked well for me in the past on netbooks, so it should work well for you.

You might also try out Xfce on Debian. It is very stable and you can download the live install version here.

[Adave]

Well not literally but it constantly ran at 100% and it was loud and hot. It even resulted in screen rendering corruption at one of my graphic cards. I have 2 switchable graphics card in my laptop and ubuntu has some issues or something with drivers for these laptops.
Beside that ubuntu was extremely slow and everytime i wanted to copy file ubuntu just froze until it was done with copying. Major issue if you ask me, it could definitely be dealt with somehow but i just got lazy. Specs : intel i5 2410, 3gb ram, intel hd3000+amd radeon 6630m 1gb, 7200 rpm harddrive.
Oh and thank you, ill take a look at it.

[pane-free]

Yes, I've heard that ubuntu can cause heating problems.

Check out these:
CrunchBang
PeppermintOS (beware -'buntu-based!)
xPUD
JoliOS

[icebirdro]

Try Linux Mint, it's similar with Ubuntu but it's low on memory usage, although I don't know how Ubuntu could have nearly fried your laptop, it's not a memory eating OS.

P.S. You might want to give CrunchBang a try too.

[MrBojangles7331]

Try Linux Mint, it's similar with Ubuntu but it's low on memory usage, although I don't know how Ubuntu could have nearly fried your laptop, it's not a memory eating OS.

P.S. You might want to give CrunchBang a try too.

I would also suggest Linux Mint. It's reasonably light weight but still contains many of the feature and ease of use as Ubuntu. I would also rate it as better in the aesthetics department but that is subjective.

Arch Linux is also a choice, but it's a little more difficult to set up -- you might need to read a guide.

If you like KDE, Chakra Linux is also a pretty good choice.

[JimBobIII]

Usually I'd agree with Linux Mint, but if you were having bad issues with Ubuntu I'd stay away from it until you figure out the cause. If you're still looking, try CrunchBang, or perhaps Fedora.

[nubbix]

Blackbox, my fav

[Victor Leigh]

If you want something lightweight that works out of the box then I recommend Puppy Linux.

It's very small. Just a bit less than 120Mb. The latest version, Slacko Puppy, is based on Slackware and has support for 4G modems. If that doesn't work, you can fall back on an earlier version, Lucid Puppy, which is based on Ubuntu. If that still doesn't work, go with Wary Puppy. Wary is created specifically for older pcs. You can install Puppy Linux in a pendrive and use it exclusively from the pendrive without installing anything into your hard drive. If you want to.

[houndhen]

I am dual booting my (inherited from my daughter) Toshiba Tecra A9 laptop. The Linux distro that I use on it is Xubuntu. It flies when compared to XP pro that is the other partition. I have also installed Lubuntu on a desktop with 512mb ram. The thing about Ubuntu/Ubuntu derivatives for someone new to Linux is the vast repositories of applications.