A Quick Look at AntiX 23

[@GeoStreber]

I installed AntiX 23 on a 24 year old Dell Pentium III laptop a few days ago. Dell Latitude CPx-J 750GT. It's surprisingly performant. Modern OS with a pretty new kernel, 5.10 LTS on a machine that's almost a quarter of a century old. The installer warned me that the HDD already has defective sectors, so my plan is to get one of those transcend IDE SSDs. Gotta run the old machine for yet another quarter century. EDIT: I got the IDE SSD, and it shortened boot times by about half. Everything now also feels a lot snappier. While originally only rocking 256 MB RAM, I found another old 128 MB module that fits, so the entire thing now has 384 MB.

[@truthislam6481]

WoW! That's the way to snub Microsoft! Which OS did you wipe to install AntiX?

[@GeoStreber]

The laptop originally came with 98SE/2000/Me or NT 4.0, but I at some point installed Windows XP on it, which ran like a charm. Today, I ordered one of these tanscend IDE SSDs. Now I'm really curious to see how much performance I can really squeeze out of the old machine. @@truthislam6481

[@adjusted-bunny]

@@truthislam6481 TempleOS

[@MrGamelover23]

That thing would crash if you opened a single browser tab. But that sounds like an awesome project. I'm so happy to hear that a 24-year-old laptop can still work with this disc room.

[@GeoStreber]

I can read wikipedia articles with it using Dillo. No problem. @@MrGamelover23

[@hudefuk]

Another thank you to the developer for maintaining a 32bit distro!

[@Maceta444]

Revived an old 2010 Acer Aspire PC with 4GB ram and Pentium processor with this one. I figured that since I spend 90% of the time in the browser the least resources wasted on the OS the better. I also switched the governor to "performance" mode to boost CPU frequency. It's blazing fast compared to the windows 10 it used to have, and almost as fast as my 8GB RAM, i5 laptop running windows 10.

[@Jeff_Seely]

This was a very thorough and well-paced showcasing Derek. Great work! I like it. It's lightweight with some unique window manager selections. Probably pretty stable. I enjoyed watching it!

[@PoeLemic]

Thanks for showing us this, and I am glad to watch you walk through it. As I am learning Linux, very nice that you walk through these different Distros.

[@lloritoovidexequield.8609]

The sections of DT's distro review/installation videos where he mentions the "strong and complicated password" part are entertaining for some reason. =)

[@alastairstaunton7081]

I think he just uses DT!!😂

[@needsLITHIUM]

Also, AntiX is my first choice for super lightweight server applications, like if I just want a little home server to run some basic CLI stuff, use as a torrent box and file share, basic LAMP intranet host for the home network, or use as a media center/HTPC, etc. If I want or need something more robust I usually go with Ubuntu Server, but just basic stuff, AntiX gets butter on the bread and bacon on the plate.

[@mchlbk]

My favourite OS, even on a new system with lots of ram and power.

[@leafheadza]

I've been a fan of AntiX for several years. You should've mentioned the Control Centre! It's one of AntiX's highlights!

[@LordTrashcanRulez]

I know right? Its apps are one of the biggest advantages. Even a Linux newbie won't have much difficulty just doing day to day tasks here.

[@nakami1081]

​@@LordTrashcanRulezas AntiX as my first distro, I didn't have much problems thanks to that!

[@BWGPEI]

Over the years you've shown me many interesting distributions to try out. Being retired this has been good for me, and I haven't tendered appreciation nearly often enough. So Thank You and all the best in your future endeavors.

[@truthislam6481]

I'm retired also, and I seem to learn something useful every time DT posts.

[@Solarsystemrdffdfyyhh]

I was given an old studio dell running on a 2008 pentium. I couldn’t get other distros except for puppy Linux to run. But wow can it run! It feels like a celeron 4000. It’s fast even watching 720 video! This thing is a dinosaur but it moves well. Looking at media surfing the web! It’s faster than vista on 2 gb of ram! I’m blown away. How snappy it feels, what it does. Even puppy Linux was choppy watching video. So if you’re unsure to give your old computer a visit. It will run on a core 2 duo. I’m going to upgrade it to 4 gb. This mammoth of a machine had a great screen and now I can use it again!

[@ThePressurizer]

I have a soft spot for antiX, it's so tiny yet quite full-featured. The developer is quite a character, too.

[@rkdeshdeepak4131]

What do you mean by the last sentence?

[@ThePressurizer]

@@rkdeshdeepak4131 He's a very vocal anti-fascist, the antiX releases are named after left-wing groups or activists, the website says "proudly anti-fascist", ... Nothing wrong with being anti-fascist, of course.

[@sweetmelon3365]

If he's naming releases after leftoids, then just call it a leftist distro. And actually tell ppl to stay away from it if the distro is so politically involved. What's it going to do if the user likes a trump tweet? Purge the boot drive?

[@Skiletro]

@@sweetmelon3365 Think you're overreacting a lil much, might be worth getting off twitter once in a while

[@Nerdamania]

@mahbodkaramoozian6409c‘mon man…

[@needsLITHIUM]

AntiX and MX Linux KDE are my favorite distros these days. Their shared tools make them functional as a portable thumbdrive or external drive OSes, which is great, but they also run really well on properly installed systems, obviously. I'm debating whether to use MX Linux or AntiX on a new low power laptop I have coming in the mail.

[@Zero-c5v]

If its low power use AntiX.

[@LordTrashcanRulez]

AntiX is honestly everything MX Linux wants to do but better. Better specialized apps, better resource usage, better developer support, etc etc.

[@MrJakeTucker]

Tempted to try this on my old Dell laptop. 2005 era. It has Debian 32bit on it at the moment. There's one thing that's making me hesitate - the laptop's wi-fi is Broadcom (BC). I just had a look at some comments on various forums. Some people seem to get BC working on antix and it picks up wi-fi spots, but not their own. I'm so used to adding the BC driver to Debian. Probably done it at least 10 times over the years. Only takes me a few minutes. I don't want to spend hours faffing around with antix and BC, especially if I can't get it to work anyway.

[@serge5046]

You can open the Control Center and choose Ceni or Connman. You could watch the video of Dolphin called "antix 17.2 basic setup and networking". Another option is to read the antiX/MX wiki Go to Networking and choose Broadcom Wireless.

[@ezequielortiz4188]

I have an HP Compaq DC 5750 Small Form Factor PC, I tested on it a lot of Linux distros for older hardware like this one, MX Linux 21 x64 Fluxbox came on Top, it out performed all the other distros like AntiX for example, the hardest part for older hardware is playing videos at high or medium definition with older graphics cards or with low specs, I was able to play videos at 720p very good with MX Linux Fluxbox, all the other distros stuttered or had a hard time trying to play videos at 720p.

[@handmade_videos]

AntiX is amazing. Just installed it on a eeePC Netbook from 2010. That old trash with an AtomCPU is now usable again! By the way, in Multimedia now there are AntixTV and Radio preinstalled. They work well. Greetings

[@Smyrf98]

Did the exact same, works wonders!

[@paolor.479]

Hi there, which antiX-full is better for an absolute beginner, sysVinit or runit? What is the difference? I am unsure, please help me. Thanks 🙏

[@tylerdean980]

Not a big difference, runit is more modern and maybe faster, but antiX recommended sysVinit if you don't know or care about init systems. The only real difference is what commands to use for dealing with system services (usually daemons)

[@Mantikal]

JWM has that "refresh menu" button - which allows new app installs to show. Open box is hit or miss if new app installs will be in the menu.

[@jeremiahlyleseditor437]

Great demonstration. Have you ever done a video about BSD that explains the differences between that and Linux variants?

[@doctorsocrates4413]

Puppy linux users will feel right at home with roxfiler.

[@h4cker_io]

❤thanks 🎉

[@jburchett1990]

AntiX is a wonderful distro.. Still waiting on the RefreshOS video though. I was surprised when I found it! It breaks the rules of DE but in a beautiful way. I had to tweak it a little for my preferences but solid none the less 😊

[@marksvirsky9103]

Is it a stable kind of distro or newer packages? Like debian sid, ubuntu non lts

[@tylerdean980]

It's stable, but you can switch to the debian testing mirrors

[@SpadlZKanapy]

You should also try Q4OS. This Debian based distro works very well on my old 32 bit HP Mini with Intel Atom and 2 GB RAM that originally ran Win XP.

[@sergiynazarenko1542]

Thanks for covering my favorite distro!

[@hindigente]

Looks better than the Lubuntu I have installed on my potato computer. I might try next time I distro hop.

[@jwk128]

"strong and complicated password"

[@basdfgwe]

What's the gripe with systemd, i keep hearing it here and there but don't understand the gripe.

[@pw1187]

Neckbreads raging over stupid stuff...nothing more nothing less

[@tylerdean980]

People dislike it because its goal is to be THE system daemon, hence the name. It's not bad software, but it is more heavy than any of the other init systems, so it's not ideal for old machines.

[@TVPInterpolation]

@@tylerdean980 imo, i havent seen any real issue of systemd being too bloated in all fairness. i dont mind that an init system does a bit more than a traditional one should do, especially when everything is in one place then.

[@tacticalcenter8658]

SystemD is full of vulnerabilities.... Lots of them.

[@tylerdean980]

@@TVPInterpolation it's a blessing and a curse, makes things simpler, but lots of new software has hard dependencies on systemd, so software is becoming less portable. Snapd for example, doesn't run on any Linux distro that doesn't use systemd or any of the BSD operating systems.

[@keepitshort4208]

How is it on x84 ? Also is it powerful enough for SQL ? For excel libra office is the substitute so is it good or is there an alternative for that which is much better ? Sorry new to Linux would really appreciate the help and guide 🙏

[@LyubomirIko]

I am newbie linux user but I install the 32bit version on laptop with 2gb ram (the CPU is actually capable of 64bit, but I thought the 32bit worth if gives some little advantage). So far I am blown away by the snappinest I am getting, I try previously ZorinOS-lite on the same laptop, but it was eating more ram. The drivers are working fine too. The problem is that you cannot install 64bit programs, so be sure your favourite app comes in 32bit version.

[@LyubomirIko]

Overall if your CPU is 64bit and you have like 4gb ram - I would recommend the 64bit version because you will forget to worry if some apps are compatible or not. I am using this lap just for KZbin and to project images with projector/second screen, so I don't need to worry. AntiX is very ligh otherwise. I think this primarily comes from the desktop environment, but I am newbie to say for sure.

[@keepitshort4208]

@LyubomirIko not sure it just says system type x86 based pc, When i had this laptop it was running windows 7 ultimate had BIOs issue, so I downloaded Chrome os and it wasn't connecting to internet, that is why I thought would go for Linux instead. That is why I asked if antix is good and which one should I go for 32bit or should go for 64bit will work too ? It's a "Compaq Presario cq60 notebook pc" Specs " Processor Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU T6400 @ 2.00GHZ, 2000 Mhz, 2 Core(s) "

[@LyubomirIko]

@@keepitshort4208 You chose 32-bit if you have less than 4 gb ram. Your cpu is 64-bit capable, so chose 64-bit. You can have all sorts of bios problems if it is configured badly, hard to help. I have to tweak few stuff to "Legacy" in order to run 32-bit actually.

[@keepitshort4208]

@LyubomirIko oh okay, it is 4 rams actually but will go 32bit

[@angelosdkg]

what is ur favorite non-systemd distro except antix?

[@Winnetou17]

Gentoo FTW! I don't know DTs answer though, though I wouldn't be surprised if he answered that some time before. If any case, you might have your answer in the next #heyDT.

[@folksurvival]

Void, Salix and Devuan.

[@leothehuman_9476]

Alpine!! But yeah, Gentoo FTW!!

[@thanasiskormas]

Slackware and Void linux

[@ordinarryalien]

Artix and MX.

[@aytviewer2421]

I went to take a look at AntiX Linux today, but was put off by their quote front and center on their website: "Proudly anti-fascist "antiX Magic" in an environment suitable for old and new computers." What does being anti-fascist even mean? What does this have to do with putting out a product? I steer clear of everything political these days.

[@hlashflahflhsjfh]

Anti fascist means being against fascism my dude

[@aytviewer2421]

@@hlashflahflhsjfh I find folks claiming to be anti-fascist are fascist these days pushing a one-view agenda. I steer clear of thought police. They usually do not even realize they are fascist bigots. Putting it front and center on your web site is a clear indication of being a bigot.

[@michaelmichaels5836]

It has a lot to do with putting out a product, fascists control everything through production, FOSS products are based in an entirely different world than market production.

[@tyh2989]

I did a frugal-static install. Rebooted to the partition and from the folder copied the "grub-entry" to grub's 40custom file. Rebooted again to see Antix entry . Good way to get Antix without affecting a working distro. To undo, all you do is delete Antix folder and grub entry..

[@sarveshrahate86]

My conky shows Disk=1.49 GB How do increase it?

[@drmoj]

Guess what! I'm using antix 23 on Hp Core i7, 16GB RAM, im enjoying the speed and the usability.

[@sebtheanimal]

It gave me a lot of faults on bare hardware, threw up it's updater/welcome screen and nearly impossible installation of nvidia drivers, on a 2014 system with 2GB for which it seems well suited.

[@zZGzHD]

yeah i've had similar issues with devuan and nvidia

[@marioschroers7318]

I never really get it with »Antix« and »Artix«. Confuses me every time.

[@Winnetou17]

I had the same problem too for a while. I thought it's only one of them and I'm just misremembering the name. Then I realized that it's actually 2 different distros. If it helps, ANtix = ANtique, minimal distro for old hardware and ARtix = ARch based minimal distro without systemd

[@leothehuman_9476]

And the fact that they are both distributions based on the big 2 (Debian and Arch) but much lighter and without systemd.

[@maxz69]

And how tf do I install it?????????? It just spits out a bunch of command lines

[@tims001]

Great distro, terrible wallpaper 😂

[@es0ptr0n]

😂🤣

[@elucidatedvoyyd]

i cant afford a great computer, antix helps me revive old crappy laptops and makes them run pretty damn well for all my needs. poverty is mainly why i got into linux, a reason that i think more people than is recognized use it. anyway i learned some distros help old hardware run better than windows and in my experience, mint with xfce was great, but antix with xfce is ideal for me.

[@LordTrashcanRulez]

AntiX with XFCE is not as good as just plain AntiX in every possible (objective) department

[@tylerdean980]

I don't know why they don't have pcmanfm or at least have the option, it's better than any of the default file managers

[@TheDanikReals]

antiX is a good distro, but i remember how there was drama tha on antiX's web browser there was built-in left wing bookmarks like "Lenin's tomb" "Left wing news" etc. I wonder did they remove these bookmarks on latest versions or no, but if not, then i don't think I'll use antiX since i want a distribution which doesn't touches politics.

[@sweetmelon3365]

It's a leftoid distro. Imagine if the user likes a trump tweet and the boot drive gets purged

[@folksurvival]

Yes, it works well in terms of being fast etc but it's an AntiFa distro so it should be boycotted and not used or recommended at all.

[@leothehuman_9476]

You guys are extremely dumb because you're exactly what the developed wanted: He is vocal about his political views so that horrible fascists won't use his OS and will be missing it out. There is nothing political in the OS itself, the only thing he ever did was adding those bookmarks to firefox which he then deleted. You might be a fascist and use that OS to do fascist things, and you can do that without anything stopping you. AntiX is free so the only ones missing out are you guys, and that's exactly what the developer wanted, that's the reason why he is vocal about politics: because he doesn't want horrible fascists to benefit from his work for free.

[@Winnetou17]

LoL sweetmelon3365 and folksurvival, I think you need a thicker skin. I mean, I don't want to say there is no chance that the dev is a cuckoo-head, you never know. There has been signs, so it is good to be guarded. But also not overreact.

[@Jeff_Seely]

I did not know this bit. I don't want political views foisted on me either. Especially lefty crap. Good thing I prefer Arch...

[@RHTORAS]

Antix is not only systemD free or non systemD as i call it but elogind free too... but why don't you show us crowz linux too... it's devuan based and qyuite follows antix road but with calamares but since you show antix then show how to work with antix... simple things newcomers would like...

[@tyh2989]

Crowz is good too, the developer gave it an extensive alias config. Much to like if you want small footprint and #! style.

[@Skelterbane69]

So it's an easier artix?

[@Winnetou17]

It's an artix very focused to run well on old hardware. This includes being based on debian, so there's little chances of updates breaking stuff. And you don't really need to update that much and often on a 15 year old machine.

[@folksurvival]

It's very different from Artix.

[@ordinarryalien]

It's a mistake to compare Antix with Artix. Artix is just Arch without systemd, or Manjaro without systemd if you will.

[@asishreddy7729]

As a new Linux user, I just don’t understand what the hate towards systemd is all about. To my newbie eyes, it’s just so awesome. It starts services automatically on boot, monitors them and keeps them running all on its own, it’s super powerful and user friendly. What’s not to like about it?!

[@leothehuman_9476]

We don't like that it may have a lot of security flaws very easily, because it has a massive million lines of code compared to just a few thousands in other init systems. We don't like that it does too much more, it does things that a simple init system shouldn't do, and because of this it's extremely big, bloated and definetly slower than other init systems while having easily security holes. It's a lose-lose situation for the user. And also it's because it's developed by IBM, who strongly pushed it to RedHat, who strongly pushed it to all the other big distros so it became the "norm", but it shouldn't be the norm that it basically monopolized Linux. What scares us is that this may be an attempt to kill open source. As you know, RedHat became closed source and we're afraid that systemd may be going to become closed too, so "finally" killling Linux. We may be paranoids but we don't trust anything that comes from such a big company, after the Linux company most close to it abandoned open source. That's just an insult to Linux. So yeah, we don't like systemd mainly because of paranoia and ideologies, but also because it doesn't really benefit that much due to the security flaws in its design. And another big reason is its monopoly: all the big distros use systemd. All of the big ones! And it comes from IBM and RedHat. It seems extremely suspicious to me, I think they will probably do some bad thing to it in the future, possibly making it closed source. What do you guys think?

[@Voshchronos]

We should be against monopolies whenever feasible

[@asishreddy7729]

@@leothehuman_9476 thanks for the explanation. Yes, it makes sense now why people are against systemd. However, I do think Linux is far from being killed off anytime soon, the community is way too passionate about it to let it happen. I think it’s safe from being killed off for at least the next 50 years, based on how much of a vibrant community is present right now. Also, so many companies and developers depend on linux and it’s robustness for their internal services, even they will oppose anyone who tries to destroy Linux. The paranoia at this point is not needed I feel, at least for the next 50-70 years. :) The complexity of the code is definitely an issue though, I strongly admire and believe in the Linux philosophy of “software should do one thing only and that one thing reliably and securely”.

[@pw1187]

People just want to rage against "big Linux" nothing more nothing less... People just using rose colored glass before systemd it was a mess with different distros using different int systems... One could make an argument. That the code is bloted and it suffers from mission creep and they would be 100% right....but it has helped Linux more then hurt it as far as everything being less fragmented... That's the reason why Linux desktop will always be a niche OS because of the fragmentation.

[@leothehuman_9476]

@@pw1187 Having different init systems didn't do any fragmentation, but is instead just freedom! For the average user, having different init systems won't change anything, so it isn't something that fragments the Linux community but it's just some more freedom!!!! Meanwhile it's SystemD who added fragmentation and removed any freedom!!! Now even things like Gnome depend on systemd, this adds a lot more fragmentation because anyone who uses any other init system will be left out. And that includes new users too, my first ever linux distro was AntiX because I wanted the lightest possible!! The systemd monopoly is the worst thing that has happened to Linux in the recent years. I don't know about any worse decision made for Linux, other than RedHat becoming closed source. Oh RedHat, right!! The first ones to push SystemD because they were pushed by IBM who made it!! Sounds great!!!!!

[@Software-ns9li]

ironic enough that the video is 23 minutes long lol

[@trinity5150]

First thing I saw when going to the Antix Linux page "Proudly anti-fascist "antiX Magic" in an environment suitable for old and new computers". I don't know of any versions of Linux that are fascist. That was just a very odd thing to put on their page :)

[@0015v]

putting "antifascist" branding on a distro that shipped with certain non-free component are just awkward in general (yes i know deblob-ing or using gnu linux-libre as the alternative kernel can be done for this distro, but still...)

[@LordTrashcanRulez]

Isn't Hyperland transphobic?

[@joaopauloalbq]

I love systemd

[@resistan-y1h]

Systemd is no different from Windows' infamous svchost.

[@sweetmelon3365]

To warn people about the distro, the maintainer is heavily politically left wing and also advertises his distro in such a manner. Just to give you an idea, last time I checked the browser's bookmarks were leftoid activists the maintainer follows. He basically uses it as left wing recruitment

[@johnharrison5511]

You can simply delete those bookmarks all at once. Are these bookmarks necessary? No, but other than that it's a really good distro.

[@ordinarryalien]

Thanks for "warning" us.

[@nelduarte311]

Who cares?... my old notebook has no claims about this "left" thing

[@leothehuman_9476]

No, he is vocal about his political views so that horrible fascists wouldn't use his work and benefit from it for free. There's no way that he's going to recruit people with only an OS, be real!

[@aquariuskiwilog]

@@leothehuman_9476 They had without the shadow of the doubt a reason behind having bookmarks and such preinstalled to suit a specific and extremist world view. And you write "be real". I seriously doubt you would be so flippant if it came to another ideology that you did not agree with.

[@aquariuskiwilog]

The open antifa and marxism the admins openly stand behind is a huge red flag for a distro. I initially liked it enough to want to research it more but the toxicity of it cannot be over looked.

[@LyubomirIko]

Capitalism is more toxic, so buckle up.

[@protoyeen]

Yes it can, it's just an OS. You can literally customize it the way YOU want, it's not like the admin beliefs are gonna effect the use of the OS.

[@INeverWanted2010]

How many Trump NFTs did you buy?

[@asim29]

AntiX is goated, based.

[@xsx1113]

are you saying there's something wrong with being anti fascist?

[@alaindevos4027]

I prefer artix

[@mchlbk]

Hardly the same.

[@helloimatapir]

"Minimal", yet it includes 4 window managers, 3 of which have near identical setups. Then it has double, even triple, of the same type of applications installed. This is the definition of bloat. Just another gimmick distro.

[@Winnetou17]

You're not wrong, but overall is not that gimmicky. It's actually really good on old hardware, out of the box (you could, of course have a manually configured Arch or Gentoo for better results. I guess Debian too). Remember that DT chose the "Full instalation".

[@leothehuman_9476]

You can chose what to install, there are different versions with different software installed. And remember, it may be slightly bloated on the big versions but it's only in programs installed. It is still extremely light, and unless you're using a very small USB to put the OS on, then that bloat is totally harmless and will benefit new users a lot.

[@tostadorafuriosa69]

Aside from software its actually really nice. It runs on old pieces of shit very well.

[@LyubomirIko]

You could always install the more barebone versions without any of the apps. The full version is not "minimal" as it comes with a lot of apps I agree. But it's definitely VERY lightweight.

[@mchlbk]

Minimal means lightweight and easy on resources while still offering 'the complete package'. If there's something you don't want it's easy to create an even more minimal remaster.

[@emem666]

I strongly dislike political propaganda distros like Antix!

[@leothehuman_9476]

It's not political propaganda. I mean, technically yes but he isn't going to change anyone's political views with just an OS. He is vocal about his political views so that horrible fascists won't benefit from his work for free. Buy anyone can use his OS and do fascist things on it, there is nothing political in the software itself. And it's free. You're the only one missing out, and you're missing out only becauae you don't agree with someone's political views. And that's exactly what the developer wanted!!

[@cherubin7th]

no D no fun. I pass.

[@tacticalcenter8658]

SystemD is full of vulnerabilities.

[@resistan-y1h]

Systemd is no different from Windows' infamous svchost.

[@nosotrosloslobosestamosreg4115]

"proud antifascists" that was all I needed to know.

[@dietzanator]

I know, awesome right?

[@nosotrosloslobosestamosreg4115]

@@dietzanator absolutely, the World Economic Forum's foot soldiers, the gang paid by the transnational corporation directories to bring terror to the People.

[@tiagoc0_5]

That's all i needed to know to install this distro !

[@nosotrosloslobosestamosreg4115]

@@tiagoc0_5 that's the reason I never installed because modern fascists always disguise themselves as antifascists.

[@nosotrosloslobosestamosreg4115]

@@dietzanator that's the reason I never installed because modern fascists always disguise themselves as antifascists.

[@jimw7916]

man u need a therepist

[@DityoManob]

Stop doing these distro review.

[@TVPInterpolation]

its pretty great for people to see the differences along such distros. especially with ones like antix. if it would be the same distro over the years i would understand that its not really needed.

[@gaiusbaltar7122]

Blend OS is worth it

[@Winnetou17]

It's a quick look, not a review. And not giving a reason or at least something else to do instead is the definition of waste of time and space. Give me my 5 seconds back!