[gdl]

If you're not afraid of the command line (or are willing to learn), Arch is as lightweight as you want it to be. The initial install is very minimalist and the package management system makes it almost trivial to build up from there. Install Openbox and Chrome and you're all set with a pretty lean system.

http://wiki.archlinux.org/

[d0m]

I'm really open minded when it comes to trying new operating systems. And of everything I've tried (varying from windows, to unix, to slackware, to ubuntu), my favorite is Arch. It's simple and clean. I really suggest that you give it a try.

[thecombjelly]

I run Arch on my $175 eee PC and it works far better than any of the other distros that I've tried. It also helps A LOT to run a very light weight window manager. I've found the StumpWM (as a bonus written in Lisp) is a great fit, although Ratpoison would be good as well.

Another advantage with StumpWM or Ratpoison is that they don't draw window borders and there is no task bar etc, so you have quite a bit more space. And since the WM is controlled by keyboard shortcuts you are actually more efficient.

[rwl]

Have you tried Debian? I run Debian on a desktop, but my sense is that its hardware support for netbooks lags a bit. I'd be interested to know how easy it is to get working on an Eee PC. (And the OP might as well: a Debian base install seems like it might be a nice compromise between the kitchen-sink approach in a base Ubuntu install and the configuration required by something like Arch -- though I don't really know.)

[thecombjelly]

Yes I have tried Debian. Debian is not near as bleeding edge and may not have as good of driver support. It is also quite often slower. If you really want the best performance, a distro like Arch is really the only easy way to get it. Arch is also rolling release which also makes it easier long term. I've actually tried probably 20 or 30 distros and Arch is my favorite. It is difficult the first few times you set it up, but the benefits are great, if you have the time and patience.

[kaens]

I'm very familiar with Debian (and Ubuntu), and Arch.

Unless you really need capitol S Stability, I would recommend running Arch, assuming you're comfortable with a unix environment, or willing to learn. It's a very clean minimalist distro, and there isn't very much to wrap your head around that isn't just common unix stuff.

[mcrittenden]

I'm not scared of the command line, but I'd rather not spend a long time setting up stuff like wifi, sound, etc. Is all that pretty easy to get going?

[_b8r0]

It's more involved than doing it on Ubuntu. To be honest the hardest thing you're likely to do is getting X running, closely followed by picking a window manager. Sound and Wifi are generally straightforward on Arch.

To put it in perspective, I use Arch on a P3-850-based Sony Vaio with 128mb of Ram and it flies.

The main things you'll get from Arch on a netbook are:

* Rolling release means that you don't have to do distribution upgrades.

* Have it your way - you pick what you want, what window manager you want, what editor you want etc. Use something like AwesomeWM, Xmonad or OpenBox to get the most out of your screen real-estate.

* Efficiency - Because you're only running what you want to run, your memory usage will be better and you wont have things you don't need lying around your hard disk, leaving the space to be filled with things you do.

The downsides:

* It's not a mainstream distro. While it has a great community, it's not as ubiquitous as something like Ubuntu. Still, Arch hasn't yet had it's eternal september so the people you do encounter know what they're talking about.

* You will tinker more and it will take up your time - if you don't play around then everything should work fine, but with the amount of flexibility Arch offers you will inevitably go through Window Managers and various tools, at the risk of breaking something.

Hope this is useful.

[xtho]

> Rolling release means that you don't have to do distribution upgrades.

This goes beyond the OP's question. How does arch handle changes in essential components like the switch to upstart in ubuntu? Does this work well with rolling releases?

[w1ntermute]

I've been an Arch user for ~1 year (Gentoo before that), and "essential component" upgrades seem to take place just fine. For example, there was a recent shift from Python 2 to Python 3 as the primary Python interpreter, and there were no noticeable problems.

[sivers]

I'm also a huge Arch Linux fan. It's my only OS, and for the same reasons you're looking for: I just wanted the bare minimum.

After you get the base installed, just type "pacman -S chromium", and it'll just install the dependencies, and voila.

Then you can just put "exec chromium" in your .xinitrc and type `startx` each time you boot up, if you want to run a browser.

[gdl]

I'm sure it varies by system and the specific hardware, but I don't think it was too bad when I did it and I'm hardly a Linux expert (I've been using Arch for a few months). There will probably be a couple hurdles as you'd expect from a fairly custom Linux install, but the extensive wiki and large community make it relatively quick and painless to figure out what's going on and how to fix it.

That said, if you're looking for something as quick and easy as possible you might want to look around a bit more to see if there are any prepackaged systems that do exactly what you want with less setup. No sense making this more complicated than it needs to be if something else comes up that closely fits your needs and could potentially save a couple hours of troubleshooting.