I've been tasked with setting up a small computer lab to teach children programming, logic circuits, and similar topics. The room has 4 identical HP Slimline Desktop computers with Intel Pentium processors and 2–4 GB of RAM. Since these machines are quite old, I plan to install Zorin OS 18.1 Lite on them.
I have two questions:
Can these machines handle Zorin OS Lite comfortably, or would it be too heavy for them?
What tools and software should I install on these computers so that I can fully control them from my personal computer — including seeing what the students are doing, sharing my screen with them, assisting them remotely, and other features a teacher might need?
I've never managed multiple computers in this way before, so detailed explanations would be greatly appreciated.
Zorin Lite should work for the 4GB of RAM. With the 2GB, it could be a bit tight. One Point would be how old these Computers are because it could be neccessary to use an older Kernel when it should be really old Hardware.
For Point 2, I'm not qualified enough. there, You should wait for other Users here.
Thank you brother for your reply !.
For the weak devices I have, do you recommend installing another version of Zorin or another distribution??
Thank you again
You can try Zorin 17 Lite in a live session (create a Zorin boot stick) and test if it works. But it is only supported until 2027.
Or more lightweight distributions with lxqt desktop, or Antix, Bodhi Linux, Puppy Linux...But some of the very lightweight distributions are not so user-friendly and good-looking as Zorin.
For Linux beginners Linux Mint XFCE and Zorin Lite are good ones, or MX Linux XFCE. But you would have to test if they work with 2 GB. The older versions which are based on ubuntu 22.04 or debian 12 often run better on old hardware than the current versions.
Is supporting programs good in old distributions??? I mainly want it to run basic programming tools. It is to teach children who may not have seen a computer in their lives Programs such as VS Code, Zed, Scratch as well as logical circuit simulations, and mainly Veyon.
There would be something what I know ... but it is a bit spare. It is called miniOS. It is Debian-based and uses xfce Desktop (and there is a Fluxbox Version, too) - but not a configured one. So, it doesn't look very pretty. But: The OS is made for running on USB Stick which means it doesn't need much RAM. So, You could use that and install it on these Devices.
The 32bit is here interesting. When these old Machines are based on 32bit Hardware, You actually have to use a 32bit compatible OS. And that is not so easy to find these Days. So, Debian 12 32bit would be a Solution. Other ... I think LMDE6 has a 32bit Version. But I'm not sure if this with the Cinnamon Desktop is too much for the limited Hardware Power. Q4OS has an older 32bit Version, too if I remember right.
