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Asked: 2010-11-30 02:32:17 +0800 CST

Minimalistic linux distro for Virtualbox?

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I want to run some Linux stuff on my XP development machine which clearly doesn't work too well in their Windows specific versions.

What would be an appropriate Linux distro to install on Virtualbox if I am concerned about harddrive and ram usage? I do not need any Gnome or graphical interface...

Thanks

virtualization linux virtualbox lamp

4 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    I would suggest a Debian minimal install.Lenny is one of the most stable distributions out there, and you can always switch to testing if you want to try something more experimental. The basic install takes about 1.5GB of space and around 100MBs of RAM.

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  2. You could try so called JEOS Distributions.

    Here is a list:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_enough_operating_system

    My favorite was SuSE Studio. You could configure an small image with an minimal System running.

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  3. It depends on what you want to run, but Fedora with the appliance kickstart will give you a very small install.

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  4. It is 2018. However, the question is still relevant.

    I wanted a Linux distro that

    a) works within Virtual box

    b) based on one of the major distros

    c) Has a pre-configured window manager, where window content on resize/move can be disabled (to avoid slow/unpleased video experience)

    e) has a window manager in (b) where I can easily change the size of fonts used in menus

    f) is under 400MB of RAM usage after a cold boot into x windows.

    g) has a general philosophy of being 'stingy' user of resources (so in compilation flags/configuration choices, etc).

    I have tried Fedora (with LXDE), Ubuntu's , Pop (System 76), Suse (although not very recent), Sparky Linux , Arch linux.

    I could not find the one that ticked all the boxes ( (c) apparently is very hard to find these days)....

    However, I finally found and settled on AntiX linux. It just checks all the boxes..

    And an 'as an icing on the cake' that demonstrates the AntiX's team philosophy here are couple of observations

    1) it is under 185 MB (!) RAM used when I boot into X windows (it uses a well configured fluxbox and conky monitor). Very good, fast and snappy experience at 1600x900, 96 dpi. My 7200 rpm disk (holding Virtual box's fixed size disk for the VM does not get accessed too much).

    Host is a Windows 10, 2011 HP 8200 SFF, i5 with intel Graphics and full of RAM (I ran several VMs including android VMs at the same time)

    2) When you login into shell and type 'emacs' -- you normally expect a delay, some hard-drive noises.. But instead AntiX greets you with immediate editor screen that is not emacs (but instead an assembler based e3) -- and with emacs keybinding ! :-) everything is just perfect for me, I thought :-).

    So hats off to AntiX team.

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