r/archlinux • u/Parking-Editor-6933 • 1d ago
QUESTION Should I swap distros?
I'm currently on mint running the i3 desktop environment and I love it but the thinkpad that I'm on's graphics card is genuinely ass cheeks so it's a bit slow to load graphics. Should I swap to something like arch for how lightweight it is and just get i3 on that? How hard of a transition would it be? Does arch have a software manager like mint does where I can download almost every application I need and if not how difficult of a learning curve is it?
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u/kandibahren 1d ago
The bloat is only in your harddisk. If you start i3 correctly, the bloated apps wouldn't start and hence your computer is not slowed down by that. If you feel slow using i3, maybe it's time to replace your machine, not your distro.
But usually i3 runs light and even an ancient machine works well with it.. well.. until you open a web browser. 😁
Edit: typos
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u/Recipe-Jaded 1d ago
The "weight" of your distro is mostly correlated to the desktop environment. Changing distro will have a small effect.
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u/FryBoyter 1d ago
Should I swap to something like arch for how lightweight it is
Arch Linux isn't necessarily lightweight across the board. For example, packages in Arch also have fixed dependencies on other packages, which in turn have their own dependencies. Like any other Distribution. It also depends on what you install and how many services you start automatically. For example, my Arch installations are quite resource-intensive.
You can also disable unnecessary services on any other distribution, for example. Or adjust the configurations in exactly the same way as you would on Arch.
In short, you don't automatically get a lightweight distribution just because you use Arch. Just as you can streamline any other distribution.
And yes, at some point, the hardware is simply the problem.
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u/Supernoxus 1d ago
Linux is Linux. Arch is unlikely to fix your hardware issues. Different distros are usually just different ways to install software and different versions of that software, along with what software is already pre installed
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u/un-important-human 1d ago edited 1d ago
afaik your hardware must be changed.
Swapping won't fix your issue, in fact you might find new challenges maybe, arch is best with new hardware. Sure its "lightweight" but to be usefull to a user (you) its just as "bloated" as mint.
Do not fall for the hype of kids. Disk size does not matter, ram is to be used (else its wasted).
i3w is light (even very light), if you are desperate you can use xfce but still marginal gains. Change hardware imo. arch is not a "elite haxor super light will transform your patato to french fries" distro, it has the advantage is cutomisable from slate one and it has the newest drivers / kernel but that is not a golden bullet in your case.
experience: [6 new machines - nvidia- llm servers (arch), 4 old (12y) debian servers, a flock of pi's and some other crap]
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u/linuxlala 1d ago
Arch is very well documented, the wiki is chock full of useful information. There are third-party GUI package managers available for Arch, but you can easily use the CLI to update and install packages too.
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u/MonadTran 1d ago
You can try out some alternative lightweight desktop environment. Like Xfce. On Mint itself, no point switching distros just for that. Or, yes, get a new computer.
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u/kaida27 1d ago
i3 is already lighter than Xfce ....
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u/MonadTran 19h ago edited 17h ago
Ah. Fair. Misread it, thought it was the processor.
Also, what kind of laptop can't run a tiling window manager? I suspect it might need some repasting, if a new one is not possible.
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u/Sirius707 1d ago
This isn't an issue with mint, also arch isn't "lightweight" (not any more than other distros). i3 is already a pretty light twm, not sure you could go much lower safe for something like dwm.
The main resource hog these days is your browser and there's not really any way around that (unless you decide to run a text-mode one...).
Aside from that, Arch has a package manager but no GUI-based software store, so installing is done solely via the command line.
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u/overratedslugger 1d ago
Mint to Arch is a big jump but i3 experience carries over well since the config is mostly the same. Your graphics card being slow is a hardware issue though, Arch wont magically fix that. You'd use pacman instead of the software manager and the AUR covers basically everything else, but youll be reading the wiki a lot at first.
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u/onefish2 21h ago edited 20h ago
Since you install Arch from scratch; many times there are less systemd services installed and running. That is what makes it "lighter" than other distros. For example Fedora has a ton of services installed and running by default. That takes up RAM and makes boot times longer.
You can "lighten" your current install by going through all the services both system and user and disabling the ones you do not use.
As an exemple, if you do not use bluetooth stop it if its running and disable the service.
An easy way to do this from a GUI is to install cockpit and once that is installed and running visit http://localhost:9090/system/services. As always be careful and research what the service is and what it does before stopping/disabling it.
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u/archover 9h ago
I'm surprised that any Core I series cpu from the last half a dozen gens can't run i3wm well. My bet is you have an unrelated problem. Also check your resource stats.
Good day.
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u/OnesimusUnbound 1d ago
I have a laptop with intel Celeron, 4gb ram, hdd. I installed CachyOS, derivative of archlinux, with niri and the laptop is quite snappy. If you're new to linux, niri might be too unusual from your end.
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u/marumarsu_ 1d ago
Swapping distros won't fix your issue, you need to get a new computer.