I decided to install Linux Mint on an old laptop that had Ubuntu 12.10. I decided to do a clean install, erasing Ubuntu since it wasn't performing properly.
Used Universal USB Installer 1.9.4.7 to create the bootable USB drive.
Went into BIOS and made sure that the laptop's first boot device was the USB.
Booted up with the USB drive plugged in and just followed the instructions on the screen. At first, it wasn't recognizing my wireless internet connection, so I had to plug my DSL modem directly into the laptop's Ethernet port to get things going.
I also had to do some skipping while it was installing language packs since that was simply taking too long.
Finally, the last "hiccup" was when there was a message prompting me to restart - I pulled out the USB drive, thinking it was safe, and so that it wouldn't boot to it on restart, but there was a kernel panic error message. I hoped for the best and simply did a hard shutdown, and when I booted up (with the USB drive unplugged), Mint was fine.
First thing I did was test if it now recognized my wireless internet connection. Still did not, so just went into settings, networks, and entered my password for wireless access. Was able to surf just fine on Firefox.
Tested an .mp4 and .mp3 file on VLC, and they played ok, so there were no problems there either.
My laptop's keyboard was causing all sorts of weird behavior, perhaps because of sticky keys. I decided to hookup a USB keyboard from a desktop. I then ran a terminal and typed in xinput --list. This gave me a list of all devices and I looked for AT ... keyboard and made a note of its ID. Then, I ran xinput float ID to disable the laptop's built in keyboard. According to some forums, you'll have to do this everytime you restart in order to disable the keyboard. I think there might be a more permanent solution out there, so that I don't have to do this process for every reboot, but for now, this temporary fix will do.
This should keep the users happy. All they want is a computer to access the internet from.
I must say, for new software an old device, Mint sure runs smoothly and looks good. Might help you breath new life into your aged computer.
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