I Tested Omega Linux To See If It Can Revitalize An Old Pc, And It Made Ubuntu Distributions Look Bad

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ZDNET's cardinal takeaways

Omega Linux is simply a lightweight Linux distro.
Based connected Arch, Omega is simply a rolling release.
Omega is free to instal and use.

Do you person an aged PC lying astir conscionable waiting to service arsenic your secondary desktop machine, aliases a measurement to return your first steps pinch Linux?

Maybe you want to skip nan Ubuntu way and spell pinch a Linux distribution that is regularly updated, lightweight, blazingly fast, and incredibly reliable. If that's nan case, don't place Omega Linux.

Omega Linux is an Arch-based Linux distribution that was created to beryllium an OS perfectly suited for older, lesser-powered hardware. This distro tin tally on:

1GB of RAM
1 halfway CPU astatine 1.5 GHz
15GB of storage

Also: Have an aged PC? These 5 lightweight Linux distributions will bring it backmost to life

Those strategy requirements screen machines built successful nan past decade.

What Omega offers

A lightweight Linux distribution based connected Arch Linux
A rolling merchandise distribution, truthful it's ever up to date
A minimal postulation of package that you tin build on
The LXDE desktop environment
The systemctl init system
Firefox, Mousepad, Vim, and a fewer different preinstalled apps
The pacman package manager

What Omega doesn't offer

A afloat postulation of package retired of nan box
A GUI app store

One of nan astir awesome things astir Omega Linux is that, during my testing, I recovered it to typically usage little than 1% of nan CPU erstwhile idle. In different words, nan OS uses very fewer strategy resources, which frees them up for applications.

Who Omega Linux is for

Omega Linux is an perfect distribution for those who want to revive aging PCs but besides for illustration Arch Linux and don't mind utilizing nan bid statement (at slightest to start).

Who Omega Linux is not for

If you're caller to Linux, Omega Linux mightiness not beryllium your champion option, particularly if you've ne'er utilized nan bid line. If, however, you are willing successful learning nan bid line, Omega Linux is simply a imaginable option.

Yes, Omega Linux will require that you usage nan bid line. During my testing, I attempted to instal some pacman GUIs, Pamac and Octopi, but some failed, which intends Omega Linux is constricted to command-line package management.

Also: 10 Linux apps I instal connected each caller instrumentality (and why you should, too)

Don't fret, arsenic Pacman isn't each that difficult. For example, I installed LibreOffice with:

sudo pacman -S libreoffice

The velocity of it all

After installing LibreOffice, I fired it up and was shocked astatine really accelerated it opened. I've honestly ne'er seen this app unfastened truthful quickly. It was practically instant… little than 1 second.

I past installed GIMP to spot really quickly it would start. This peculiar app is notorious for slower startup times because it has to load truthful much. The first clip I opened GIMP, it took astir 5 seconds to open. However, aft that, GIMP was fresh to spell successful half nan time.

Also: This lightweight Linux distro is nan champion (and easiest) measurement to revive your aged computer. Here's how

This is awesome because Omega Linux was capable to unfastened these apps faster than my System76 Thelio moving Pop!_OS pinch 32GB of RAM and an AMD Ryzen 9 7900X 12-Core CPU.

If you want speed, Omega Linux should beryllium connected your radar.

I've tested a batch of lightweight Linux distributions, and Omega Linux has quickly risen to nan apical of my database of recommended options. Even though you do person to usage nan bid statement to instal applications, if you don't mind that, you'll beryllium rewarded pinch unheard-of velocity and reliability.

Also: Why this lightweight Linux distro won't triumph immoderate fame contests but is cleanable for powerfulness users

If, connected nan different hand, you're much willing successful simplicity, I would opportunity instrumentality pinch nan likes of Lubuntu aliases Linux Lite.