Check prices on eBay… quite reasonable for used/refurbished Dell laptops…

I’ve had excellent service/performance running linux for 8+ years on several Dell E6500s, 8GB, core 2 duo, 15.6". Price on eBay today $75, $12.72 shipping.

Also run linux with excellent service/performance on an E6420 with 8GB, 14", E6530 & E6540, both with16GB, 4 core, 15.6".

An 8GB, 14", E6420 can be bought, including shipping, for less than $50

Excluding the E6420, all the systems I’m using have DVD R/W drives and backlit keyboards.

Haven’t had any driver or other problems with any of the systems running linux.

Mr. Anderson, Thank you for your analysis/work and well written treatise, on PID 0. I enjoyed learning more about Linux & Unix and a bit of history thereof as well.

Easy & quick install. I don’t recall the last time anything went wrong. Great performance with lots of useful tools developed by MX team. sysV by default - init freedom… you can boot systemd if desired and interesting… there’s an UNOFFICIAL init-diversity respin with 5 inits: sysVinit, systemd, runit, s6 & s6-66 selectable at boot menu:

https://www.antixforum.com/forums/topic/mx-23-2-init-diversity-respin/ https://forum.mxlinux.org/viewtopic.php?t=79448

Been exclusively running MX with Openbox (OB) since early 2019 on my 6 home systems All run great without any issues.

Also remotely support 3 senior, 70+ (one is 85) , users. In 2021, using ‘live’ DVD, switched them to MX from Linux Mint with their assistance to initially install/config SSH, then used SSH & VNC to finish MX install. Took about 45 minutes per system. These seniors are just users, not in any way computer nuts; email, web, simple games (Mahjong, solitaire, etc.) and occasionally LO Writer & 1 uses LO Calc for home budget. They all adapted to MX quickly over a couple of days. I rarely get any support calls and they faithfully do upates without prodding from me. The Calc user occasionaly calls for assistance with… well… Calc.

I also run 3 MX VMs: 1 for banking, 1 for paying bills, 1 for managing investments, each is used specifically/exclusively for intended purpose. NO web browsing, games or installs, downloads only from sites relative to VM - account statements from bank on banking VM, etc.

Discovered MX-18.1 in 2019 by chance while on a rare ‘excursion’ into distro hopping. Installed MX & OB in a VM (good ol’ Virtualbox) in about 20 minutes, including the time adding/editing my OB config from my daily driver at the time, CrowZ. After a few days, switched all my systems to MX and haven’t considered using any other distro since.

I’ve tried many distros over 15 years. My favorite distro is #! (Crunchbang) which sadly is no longer available. When #! ended I switched to CrowZ, a Devuan spin using OB - obviously I prefer OB.

So yes, I like and run MX exclusively although I would switch to #! if the ‘original’ #! project ever resurrects.

Blue Skys, Green lights to all…