I have an old laptop, which is currently running windows 98 very slowly, I don't want to run 98 for many reasons, and instead want to run linux.
The laptops specs: Pentium II 128mb RAM 299Mhz, 6.2gb hdd
Speed is an issue with me, and I'd like the laptop to run as fast as it possibly can, without me having to wait, basically like a nice desktop pc or laptop. And I want to know which distro would run best. Arch linux?
I also plan on installing some nice GUI programs, namely open office. I've been told running open office on this machine will mean open office runs quite slowly, are there any better office suites for the job that can open and save in open document and microsoft file formats?
I dont have many worries regarding the size of the HDD, as linux takes up considerably less room than windows. How much space should I set as swap to optimize the laptops performance but not lose a single unnecersary mb of space? Im not entirely sure how much programs like open office take up on disk, frankly I havent really had to worry about it, so id like to be a strict as possible with my diskspace as I don't want to run out.
The laptops primary uses will probably be word processing and not to complex spreadsheets and maths.
Some music too and possibly some videos but not really anything too intensive, a standard pc.
Thanks for any help you can give me as I realise ive asked allot