
A 64 bit image is also available for newer computers. I downloaded the LXLE 14.04 32 bit ISO image for my Acer Aspire One from the LXLE website. Their website’s About page states, “Its intention is to be able to install it on any computer and be relatively done after install.” Let’s try it out. That will work for this laptop, and being based on a long-term release will make it easier to maintain for a newer Linux user. Its minimum recommended system requirements are 512 MB of RAM and 8 GB of hard drive space. The LXLE 14.04 release is based on Lubuntu 14.04 Long Term Release with the LXDE desktop. I’ve found Lubuntu to be very suitable for netbooks or lower-spec desktops that are struggling to continue running Windows XP. It uses more resources than distributions that aim to be able to run on antiquated systems with very limited memory such as Puppy Linux and Crunchbang, and is comparable to Lubuntu, which is still on the light and speedy end of the spectrum. I didn’t have to hunt for download links or distribution information as I’ve become used to doing on most other distribution websites. I liked the fact that their website is easy to navigate and read, and provides a succinct and clearly stated description of the distribution, its main features, and their philosophy.

Their main goal is to be a drop-and-go operating system, primarily for aging computers. The LXLE distribution came up as an interesting option, and was well reviewed for being easy to use and very polished for a lighter distribution. I aimed for a lightweight Linux distribution that would also be relatively kind to someone coming from a Mac OS or Windows background.

This netbook has an Intel Atom N455 CPU (1.66 GHz, 512 KB cache) and 1 GB of RAM, with 250 GB HDD storage.

I’m happy to say that the process was successful, and reformatting restored the hard drive to a functioning state! I decided to give it another go to see if the netbook could be reincarnated under another operating system. Hard drive errors prevented operating systems loaded from USB from accessing files on disk. My Acer Aspire One has been sitting idle for almost three years now, unable to boot up to Windows 7 32bit.
