My new go-to for all things Linux.
Best distro I have found and I have tried many. Mint, MX, antiX, tiny core, easy, etc, etc, etc.
Does not load your PC down with a bunch of pre-installed stuff that you will never use.
Excellent base to build a system that you will use however you choose.
Even a noob like me can get everything up and running the way they want with very little effort.
I was a bit hesitant at first because it does not come with much, but the visuals made me want to keep going and as I went I found out how easy it was to keep going.
And the Bodhi team is very helpful. I got all my answers just from looking at their forum and wiki without having to ask additional questions.
Bodhi is the lightest and still perfectly usable distoro for day to day use. Much lighter than Lubuntu and much more usable than antiX, Q4OS or wattOS. Customization with one click is one of the strengths of this distro. Themes are rich in variety and there are a lot of them. Localization is a big plus inherited from Ubuntu, but few custom apps are missing support for my language. I have resurrected several 10+ years old notebooks with this OS that serve well for seniors and kids. Overall this is my top pick for old computers.
It was worth the weight. Bodhi 7 is for me the best lightweight Linux distro in the world. It is also one of the most beautiful. The new wallpaper is so gorgeous that I can't bring myself to put anything else on it.
I have used Bodhi 4, 5 and 6, and my old Gateway from 2009 continues to age, but Bodhi 7 seems to be as fast and stable as any of the others. I didn't have to do much in the way of customization, and what I did was fairly easy. for example, I like the desktop switcher to be on the bottom panel, like in LXDE. By default, Bodhi has it on the right side. By fooling a bit with it I was able to get it where I want.
It was easy to install, and the software center makes installing other software easy as well. I always put Synaptic Package Manager on my Ubuntu-based distros. I also found Chromium too heavy for my graphics-challenged Gateway. so I installed Libre Wolf (which is a bit of work, but a few copied commands in the terminal, copied directly from Libre Wolf's website, made it a breeze). I like Libre wolf over Firefox, since it has the privacy options I like enabled by default. The new browser manager (based I believe on Zorin), makes installing browsers very easy, and there is a nice selection to choose from.
I really can think of nothing to complain about with Bodhi. I also have it on our old Dell Inspiron laptop, which runs very hot. We can't even keep the battery in it, and only run it from AC. But Bodhi keeps it from overheating.
Bodhi may straddle the line between desktop environments and window managers, but it feels much more like the former. It is unique in that respect. At least, I know of no other distro quite like it. Bodhi 7 is a Grand Slam in my opinion. Great work by the development team!
What others have said about Bodhi -good or bad it's up to you- is true: it is lightweight (a lot), it has a distinctive theme based on their heavily customized version of Enlightenment desktop, it is very minimalist, you have to read their documentation to save valuable time when you try to configure it to your needs.
This is not a review about the pros n cons of Bodhi in general. It's about what new version 7.0.0 brings to the table in comparison to 6.0.0. and I can say from the start I'm not very enthusiastic. Apart from the more recent base-system which of course is an apparently significant upgrade (+ the hwe and s76 isos now available), Bodhi 7.0.0 features a new theme / layout that is in my opinion not as sophisticated and polished as the default theme in version 6.0.0. New plymouth animation is unremarkable. You boot up to the fresh Bodhi desktop and immediately strikes you as odd that the new theme looks not properly adjusted to the screen. It is actually off-set in all different displays (resolutions) I tried it oob. Tray icons in the notification area have irregular sizes unlike version 6.0.0. There are ways to adjust panel, icon and menus dimensions to scale better with your actual screen dimensions but do we have to? We didn't in previous versions. Isn't it enough struggling to set appearance settings and keyboard bindings with quite obsolete and unintuitive graphical tools already? It is characteristic that the new default icon-set includes fewer icons for known applications. Firefox, keypass and many other programs had their own cute green icons in Bodhi 6. No more. I would expect the reverse: adding more programs to the system icon set. So new Bodhi, although it rested in beta for quite a while, feels nevertheless rushed and rough around the edges compared to its previous incarnation. I will still keep recommending Bodhi to people who want to install Linux on old hardware yet not the newest version but the old n tried 6.0.0. Using a fitting metaphor: Final "enlightenment" is still far away. Our Linux soul will still be trapped for another cycle of existence in the vain embodiment of version 7.
Bodhi Linux is an exceptional distro! endless customization and flexibility coupled with speed and minimalism, giving you the perfect system to build on what you want.
Only distro capable of breathing life into my 10+ HP Pavilion 1600, making it feel brand new, a beast on my workstation at the office. Bodhi being based off of Ubuntu also makes it a great choice for app availability, it supplies everything i need.
The Moksha desktop environment is very easy and comfortable to use, developed in house by Bodhi team.
Features and functionality can be extended by loading and unloading modules which is very useful.
I cannot recommend this distro enough, everything just works from home to the office.
Special mention to the community who are very welcoming, always friendly, willing and helpful. The Devs for creating an easy and stable system to use, a cut above the rest.
- bloat free
- very light (free -m) 268 MB with WIFI running
- fast
- elegant, very customizable desktop
- fantastic support from the developers and forum members
- about the best if not the best documentation of the other than major distros
- Bodhi's App Center is a cut above the rest
Cons:
- you need to know what apps you want to add as this is a minimalist distro
- you need to know basic Linux maintenance or read the docs
Bodhii is a superlative niche distro. It is not intended for newbies or the CLI adverse.
Bodhi is an anti-bloat distro. The assumption gong in is the user is in charge/knows what apps they want to install and Bodhi assists with a fine selection of curated software in its App Center that is tested to perform with Bodhi.. In V7.0 you may also select from a wide assortment of browsers. Bodhi makes Installation is a breeze.
The Moksha desktop is elegant and good looking with a wide variety of themes and wallpapers available. IMO,for its weight Moksa gives you the most bang for your RAM buck in terms of looks,customization, and performance. The wide assortment of Moksha modules gives the user an easy way to add functionality to the desktop environment.
But where Bodhi stands out is in terms of documentation and the warmth, camaraderie, and helpfulness of its forum. The developers are extremely accessible, diligent,and polite. There is a family atmosphere to the forum. There really are few smaller distros that can match Bodhi in this regard, Puppy is similar in tone.
Given Bodhi is very clear whom it is suitable for, I rate it a 10 out of 10. Bodhi is a Linux distro at its finest.
Tried it, works good, but too much effort to set up the way I would like it. I could not find anywhere to install nvidia drivers. Linux Mint is so much easier to set up without spending all day on it. If you have got the time to configure it. Fonts are too small on high resolution monitor and I didn't like the way it looked after I increase the size. If it didn't require so much effort to configure it, I would likely give it a harder look and a better ranking. It seems to be pretty speedy, but I have a speedy computer as well.
It's a combination of the broken Moksha (Enlightenment) theme, still at version e17, despite e25 being the current version, the faulty GTK theme, and an icon set with the elegance of an elephant footprint.
The performance and the memory consumption are OK, but because it ships with only a dark theme, it's pretty useless. Bodhi doesn't ship with any light Moksha themes; those few on their website are either broken, plain ugly, or most often both.
There are not many compatible themes on the Internet either, and even if one does find one, there will be no GTK theme or icon set matching it. Maybe someone who doesn't care for the looks and buggy Moksha/Enlightenment might find some use for it, but I see no reason to keep it.
On the one side, one gets configuration possibilities for everything; on the other side, one gets lost in the "endless options," but one also has no option for the most basic things like setting the mouse cursor or the font size. Scaling the environment will not only make the font larger but also other GUI elements.
There is a good reason why Enlightenment distros are so rare these days.
I love the speed of Bodhi, I just can't get used to it's particular desktop paradigm( I lost some shelves while learning). It's extremely promising if they could make it a little more intuitive. I gave up, after a while(I know that I shouldn't have). Frustration just got the better of me. It is a very nice system for someone who is already familiar with linux. I don't think a beginner could handle it(YMMV). Until I get up the courage once again to dive in once again, I will go back to MX and Mint.
I used this distro on my low spec computer for 2 weeks, VERY lightweight, best part about Bodhi I must say is their community, friendly and helpful. But I have since moved on to another lightweight distro, almost feel bad about that lol since the devs of Bodhi and the community is a cool bunch and they helped me alot, but I'll couldn't get used to the workflow in the Moksha DE, but it was an interesting experience, who knows I'll might pick up Bodhi again in the future. One thing more, I wish more distros would theme their terminals like Bodhi have! Just awesome looking.
You should definitely try Bodhi, and especially if your looking for something in the lightweight area.
Bodhi is a distro that does exactly what it sets out to do, it actually hits its target. It aims to provide support for older hardware or newer hardware for users that want a minimalist approach in an elegant yet light desktop.
This is a distro for more hands on types who know what apps they want to run and know what they want in a desktop. This is not a distro for Windows only types who are afraid of a command line and ave no desire to read documentation but it is an easy to use distro with fantastic documentation and dedicated forum support. The developers are very engaged with their audience.
Bodhi is stable. lightweight, fast and elegant. The documentation is a cut above most distos as is the welcoming tone of the support forum.
It is simply the best distro: it has the base of Ubuntu LTS, but at the same time it does not have any of the problems of Ubuntu: its bugs, its snaps, etc. Bodhi is more solid than Debian itself: I've been using it since version 5 (based on Ubuntu 18) and I've never had any bugs. I have installed Bodhi 7-beta and all runs like perfectly.
You have to configure it from the beginning, as a Debian. It is heavy work but worth it. The desktop is retro and also takes a lot of work (and knowledge) to set up to your liking. It is not easy to use if you don't know it.
I don't know of any other distro that is so light and stable and bug free. The desktop allows for any functionality, although I'm not sure if it will work well with Steam. On old hardware it runs great, on new hardware it flies even faster.
My current hardware is a Lenovo that doesn't work well with Wayland or Plasma, it doesn't work well with Linux Mint or Arch either, Opensuse doesn't recognize sound. But Bodhi Linux recognizes everything.
n addition, Bodhi Linux supports and collaborates with a Mexican Distro called Escuelas Linux, which is wonderful: it is a Bodhi Linux already configured and loaded with many programs, aimed at poor schools.
I love you, Bodhi Linux, and I love you with an everlasting love, eternal flame! Good Job!
I am running BL 6.0 on a 2009 MacBook Dual Core with 6G RAM.
I found Moksha; like any new DE takes some getting used to but any more so than my experience with DEs that I have not tried before like Xfce, LXQt etc. And definitely much easier than some other light weight DEs I tried like Trinity or IceWM
Another aspect BodhiMoksha is the defualt theme - you either like it or you hate it. There is a nice range of themes (and icons as well) available in the Bodie app center - try them all. And if you are adventurous you can find some Enlightenment themes on the Internet that will work as well. Same with icons - create a .icons folder in /home/user dir and download a few Icons sets from B00merang (Win 7 and 10 being my favorite). You can mix and theme atributes and icons in settings the Look settings as well. Moksha is quite customizable.
Light weight and fast on low resource systems was what I needed. That is where Bodhi shines. Out of the box it only take 160m of RAM. As a comparison I looked at some of the different supposedly "light" distros that I have tested in VirtualBox. I measured these systems (htop RAM) out of the box except for Bodhi Standard 6.0 which was configured with the applications that I typically use - Abiword, gnumeric, Xarchiver, gdebi firefox, firejail and several more. The htop figures for RAM were:
Bodhi Standard 6.0 185m, LinuxLite 200m, Lubuntu 233m, LXLE 319m, Peppermint 320m, Q4OS 339m, Xubuntu 499m
I am running BL 6.0 on a 2009 MacBook Dual Core with 6G RAM.
I found Moksha; like any new DE takes some getting used to but any more so than my experience with DEs that I have not tried before like Xfce, LXQt etc. And definitely much easier than some other light weight DEs I tried like Trinity or IceWM
Another aspect BodhiMoksha is the defualt theme - you either like it or you hate it. There is a nice range of themes (and icons as well) available in the Bodie app center - try them all. And if you are adventurous you can find some Enlightenment themes on the Internet that will work as well. Same with icons - create a .icons folder in /home/user dir and download a few Icons sets from B00merang (Win 7 and 10 being my favorite). You can mix and theme atributes and icons in settings the Look settings as well. Moksha is quite customizable.
Light weight and fast on low resource systems was what I needed. That is where Bodhi shines. Out of the box it only take 160m of RAM. As a comparison I looked at some of the different supposedly "light" distros that I have tested in VirtualBox. I measured these systems (htop RAM) out of the box except for Bodhi Standard 6.0 which was configured with the applications that I typically use - Abiword, gnumeric, Xarchiver, gdebi firefox, firejail and several more. The htop figures for RAM were:
Bodhi Standard 6.0 185m, LinuxLite 200m, Lubuntu 233m, LXLE 319m, Peppermint 320m, Q4OS 339m, Xubuntu 499m
Been using for a while on two machines, a desktop (circa 2012) and a laptop (circa 2006).
Boots up from cold in under 30 seconds on both machines, standard ISO HDD (not SSD) installs.
Very consistent and stable, no weird unexpected behaviour, runs for months without needing a restart, suspends and resumes almost instantaneously.
Uses only 190MB RAM idle on boot. Absolutely no bloat on the standard ISO install. Though I'm not short on either RAM or disk space, efficiency is always welcome.
Have noticed some comments about not enough apps in their App Store. As it's Ubuntu LTS based, the repo has thousands of apps that the user can pick based on their preference. It's just for convenience that a handful of the most useful ones are setup so that they can be installed through a web browser. This does not limit the full selection in any way.
I prefer the default enlightenment theme and like to keep it minimal.
Last but not least, their forum is very welcoming; members and devs are very helpful. I'm not a member but do regularly check them to see what's going on and notice most questions get attended to pronto.
Credit goes to Devs for creating such a finely tuned distro. Great job guys :-). Much appreciated.
What is there to say that had not been already said! :p
Bodhi is a breath of fresh air in the "monkey see, monkey do" gnu/linux world.
Extremely lightweight and efficient distro, no bloat whatsoever just sane choices for software in the appack release.
The Moksha desktop is very fast and responsive and perhaps the greatest feature for me is the "click anywhere menu" which is such a time saver, no more wasting time looking for apps/places. Key bindings are easy and more could be added = Amazing!
Beautiful theming out of the box, extra themes are preloaded in the appack release and easy to install in standard release.
Software availability (office, gaming, music, etc) is vast, i have found everything i can possibly use in a lifetime and so easy to install by using app centre or synaptic package manager. APT in cli is available also
Bodhi is extremely stable. i have used it exclusively for all my work and gaming needs for the last 2 months and i cannot be more impressed. no restarts, nothing. It just runs!
Cheers to the Devs for their great work and dedication in creating this gem of a distro. I can not recommend Bodhi Linux enough ;)
I like the speed very much, its just the user interface could be more intuitive. If Bodhi was easier to use it would be among the top five Linux distros. Even so it is nice, especially for being minimal. I did not get the chance to see how big the software selection is because I uninstalled because I inadvertently took apart some of the desktop items and could not figure out how to restore them. It was frustrating. One day I hope to give it another shot, because as I said before the speed was nice.
It's the only one, that works on all my old machines at home! Even at the very old one's. Well done!
The first three or four recommenditions from Berlios.de wasn't able to install at all (#1-4). These doesn't work!
Bhodi gives new Life for old Notebooks.
Easy to install. Easy tu setup all important functions. Also WLan and so on. Lightweight. Quite fast. It looks very nice. Very handy. I love Moksha. It looks very modern.
Please offer more Apps in the Bhodi App Store. In my opinion, this is in other distros better made.
Incredible distro for older PCs, low-power machines and netbooks, with the only drawback to it being that it uses more storage than most OSes to install, and if you don't have a lot of space go for Puppy (which it actually uses comparable memory to!). It's relatively easy to use and the forum is helpful and friendly although aside from Moksha and Enlightenment related-issues most of the time it is not necessary as it is built on top of Ubuntu so there's plentiful resources for whatever you need.
I love Bodhi Linux. Mint is still the one I suggest to those new to Linux, but once you're used to it and want something that is real light on resources then Bodhi is a great choice.
The desktop might need more tweaking with Bodhi using Moksha but some people like it as is. I added a bit more color and replaced the panel widgets from the variety of themes available.
The Bodhi forum is great with very friendly people who are knowledgeable.
It's a 5 year distro and version 6 is good until April 2025.
It runs fairly stable, allows a wide variety of software to be installed. Never used the Bodhi App Centre, always installed manually / via APT.
Moksha desktop is ok, although the Widgets something to get used to.
However, it keeps disabling my WiFi unexpectedly which cannot be resolved other than a re-boot (yes, Windows style!).
The Forum is blocking access with a decent VPN or TOR, so that's of no help either, counter-productive to basic security.
I'm not writing it off but if you can get by w.o a forum and the occasional "hiccup", this is good for you.
After hopping and bopping countless distros I stumbled upon Bodhi 6 a couple of months ago. There is a significant learning curve if you want things JUST RITE, and I gave up on it once, but the sheer speed brought me back to spend more time and I am glad I did. It's kind of like when I bought a brand new pickup... there was nothing to DO on it, so I never really bonded with it. Old cars and trucks, yes, you work with them and bond with them or you toss them. Well, Bodhi, after a day or so of tinkering HARD, has produced a workhorse for me. Things like trying to get Google Earth running on it were not trivial with my Intel HD 630 video hardware (HP570), but, as I say, tinkering works, as long as it's not mind blowingly tough. Most other things just work. This distro is almost as fast as Puppy itself, much faster than MX or even Peppermint. I get bored when I have to boot Win 11 for some reason, with the wait times. Puppy is cool, but disasterously tough to work with for me. MX and Peppermint were fun, but MX had too many bugs for my comfort and would not boot on about half of my laptops. Bodhi has worked everywhere and is nice enough looking out of the box to just start using. SPEED and EFFICIENCY of Bodhi, along with its usability make this a KEEPER!
I like low powered computers as I use a mini box M350 fanless mini itx case with an Intel N3050 processor 1.6 ghz turbo to 2.08 ghz ,this is a nominal 6 watt processor, (my case will run fanless up to 10 watt ) I love the silence and the absolute economy of it ,compare to an i3 Intel processor nominal 52 watt ,once just a fad now an economic necessity ,i.e.less than one sixth of an average power use ! with that set up you can run a gnome distribution but it is slow but when you put Bodhi on it it will just just fly. Bodhi works really well and so many low resource distributions are no where near as low resource as they claim but Bodhi uses less than 200 of ram from the start and is a complete system ,i.e. nothing missing and with every thing that you could want from Ubuntu software. my system is mini itx motherboard with N3050 processor ( no processor fan ,no case fan and 8GB of ram and an 128 GB ssd ) = total silence and full performance,this would be overkill with 4 GB of ram.I can do every thing on this system that I can do with an i3 system that I have ,but this is the one I always use,Bodhi 6 really is the answer if you want top performance from inexpensive hardware and using less than one sixth of the power. I mostly do what the majority of people do,email ,surfing news and Linux websites ,Ebay,Spotify,steaming live TV and music,Facebook etc. I have distro hopped and tried many alternatives and Bodhi 6 is superb and streets ahead of anything else,yes it takes a while to get used to it and to understand how it works but so worth the effort, " SIMPLY THE BEST "
High quality combined with light weight. Can be used as your primary operating system without any sacrifice. In fact it might be the best choice as you want to work efficiently and not have your computer freeze up to take to much time when rendering or copying files for example. Everything worked on multiple computer installs. You can do program installs from the app center or appimages. Not an issue for running any program I have found. Ram usage very low, just a pleasure to use. I have tried other distros from Puppy (which I really like) to Lubuntu (which I like) and others like MXlinux (would not install for me). But Bohdi works and you can theme it anyway you like.
I forgot this one yesterday. I installed Bodhi on my old 32 bit HP computer. It works pretty well. I am impressed. There were a couple of bugs but the latest update has fixed everything.
I decided to give this a try just because this computer has been sitting for about 6 years doing pretty much nothing. I had an old 32 bit version of Deepin on it which I only used to download and burn iso images.
With all of the research and testing different linux distros, I wanted to see just how well an operating system can be designed to run an old machine really well. I find that this works pretty much as well as the new MX despite the limitations. For the basic computing tasks that I do, this is fine. I use e-mail, watch videos, music, etc. I haven't tried it with Skype or Zoom but I have both of those on my other 2 computers. Finding this might just be a way to actually run this computer right into the ground rather than tossing it just because it has older hardware.
If you need a simple system for an older computer, I highly recommend this.
I really like Bodhi Linux. My biggest problem with it is the lack of community support. If something goes wrong its difficult to find an answer. If it was not for this problem it would be my distro of choice hands down. The devs do a great job with this. Any linux user would would love the customizability of this distro. If the community support for this was ever to change. This would be my goto Linux distro. Clean crisp and looks great looking. A little different and takes a bit to get use to but it is worth it once you do.
2 gb ram
Pentium dual core 2.00 ghz processor
160 gb ide hdd
Radeon hd 2400 pro
I tried Bodhi on this pc and really love it. Of course sometimes feel slow because 64 bit os with 2 gb ram, thats so normal. But generally beats Windows 7 32 bit... 200-300 mb between ram usage on idle (yes in 64 bit, not 32 bit)
I can play 0 ad, Half life 1-2, dont starve together, cs source, retroarch etc...
I have 1 fps with proton. Dunno, maybe my gpu is so old for proton etc.
Windows 7 ultimate 32 bit and / Bodhi Linux 6.0.0 i like this combo in this pc.
The live boot pushes the choices you have to make down to the edge of the screen where you cant see it. So it gets hung on the language screen, trying to tab over does not work either. Safe graphics mode will get you in but then you cant adjust for your resolution while in safe graphics mode. Put the choices in the middle of the screen until the person can get booted and then adjust the screen resolution.
This is by far one of the best GNU/Linux distributions I have tried which combines the power of Ubuntu with the minimalism of Moksha creating something that is definitely a Tinkerer's Dream Come True, also with the choice of themes and the low ram usage that it has I cannot complain even if I want to
Super fast boot on hp 8530w with an SSD. Has all the customization I could ever ask for. For some reason Ricoh R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller is disabled so haven't figured out how to access my dv camera that worked ok in latest xubuntu and linuxlite. Still 6.0 is a keeper.
Superb lightweight distro. Moksha takes some getting used to, but it works. Installed the base edition on my personal laptop, and runs smoothly without any glitches. Cannot complain.
Installing on Dell XPS15 9570 without any problem
Very nice, clean and extrem fast desktop
The best bodhi-version ever, fast and stable,
Based on ubuntu lts, no more words to say for everyday users
6.0.0 HWE. Very happy, minimal instalation,but is running kernel xanmod with the page instructions, 3 windows firefox consuming less than 1.1gb, for my use is a great advance and a non brainer.
Hands down the best ultra-lightweight distro out there! It only uses about 160mb of ram idle, which is the lowest I've seen in a "just works" desktop distro other then Q4os trinity. The standard release is pretty minimal with only a number of basic applications per-installed which is a refreshing sight compared to many similar distros, this means it installs pretty quickly even on low end hardware. I mean sure, the UI can feel a bit clunky out of the box, but its pretty easy to customize. It also has a very helpful and kind discord server. My main complaint would be the lack of window snapping, and the lack of a search bar, but I've gotten around this by installing Ulauncher. Overall a excellent versitile distro that uses impressively low system resources :) 9/10
Lightweight. Quick. Stable. Highly configurable/customizable (if you take the time to learn Moksha. Friendly community on Discord and their forum. Have been using Bodhi for years as a daily driver.
this distro is wonderful, and i think this version 6.0 is much better than 5.0. Both are very fast, but I find this latest version more stable, the desktop is not misconfigured as before, it is modern and fast, and personally I love the icon themes that it brings by default, but more cheerful themes can be installed with a click . You have to build it little by little, but I have not had stability problems unlike other Ubuntu-based distros.
A beautiful distro that puts you firmly in the driver's seat. A lot of thought and great taste has clearly gone into the theming, icon sets and general appearance. The distro follows a minimalist approach only installing what is needed to get you going. Then you decide what apps you want to build the system you want. As a long time Arch Linux user this approach is greatly to my liking. because the distro is based on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS you also have all the Ubuntu packages available to you. The Settings Panel gives you a ton of options to tweak and customize the system precisely to you liking.
After using the distro for a week on an 11inch screen Lenovo Ideapad I have found it to be stable. I find myself reaching for the little Ideapad more and more often rather than my main laptop which runs Arch. So basically you have a beautiful, tastefully designed, stable, minimalist and highly customizable distro.
The only flaws I have found so far is the vast number of notifications you get. They don't get in your way since tou have to open the notification gadget to see them and you can turn them off in the Settings. Also my function keys don't work. But that seems to be an Ubuntu thing since they don't work in Ubuntu 20.04 but do work in 20.10.
Quirky, but extremely stable with great support. Many cool features for such a lightweight distro, once you figure out how to use them.
One of the first things you'll want to do after installing, is go to Settings in the Notification gadget, then go to the History tab and blacklist EPulse, so you don't get a notification pop-up every time you change the volume.
Bodhi has been slowly but steadily climbing the DistroWatch ladder the last few months and I expect the trend will continue if people give it a chance.
I've been using Bodhi Linux on my 2007 & 2013 iMacs since 4.0. For the work I do, this distro is my favorite. It is quick. The minimalist approach is nice. It doesn't come with a lot of apps I'll never use.
Other than a few system tools, I only use Firefox, Thunderbird and LibreOffice Writer for correspondence. Printer setup was quick and easy. The PCmanFM file system is very quick. Now that I'm used to it, I find that it works quite well for me.
I installed 6.0 HWE on my 2007 iMac about a week ago. Both machines are set up exactly the same. Transition to the Thunar file system was easy. So far there have been no issues. I'll upgrade the 2013 machine soon.
Actually I enjoy the Moksha desktop. The default green is not to my liking. Thankfully it is easy to change to a different theme. For me it's a plus the desktop isn't easily cluttered. I prefer keeping everything put away when I'm finished working.
Hopefully this distro will be around for a long time.
Una buena distribución ligera con Soporte Dual monitor con 2 GPU gracias a Moksha.
XFCE no soporta dos GPU varias distros ligeras la usan y es incomodo para lo que usamos Dual GPU monitor
Bodhi Linux Simplemente Funciona, Instalar lo que necesites es muy sencillo al estar basado en Ubuntu es muy facil.
Un consumo de Ram de 220-300MG es demasiado ligero y funcional sin sacrificar tanto.
Tenia una Ram dañada con varios BSOD en Windows 10 y varios bloqueos en Ubuntu y MX linux
Bodhi Linux simplemente continuo trabajando normal con muy pocos fallos ahora que logre como Usar BadRam trabajo sin problemas.
As long as you're prepared to get used to this distro's somewhat "different" interface - it's a very very good operating system, one of the best out there.
I've been interested in this distro since the days of MacPup, but did not get it to work on any hardware I had until 5.0. I've happily used 5.0, 5.1, and now 6.0 on nearly every machine I've had my hands on, and have it on two machines right now.
I understand Robert Wiley's reason for having chromium as the default browser, and it's a good one. That doesn't mean I have to use it -- Anyone who wants Firefox can add it easily.
The settings are still a royal jumble. It is difficult to figure out what some of them do, and some of the names are quite similar. I'm not ready to use this distro full time, but I use it as a stress relief from Mint or other distros I have to use to get work done.
Robert is still working on the 32-bit version of Bodhi 6, but it should be out soon. This is a lightweight distro for a large number of reasons, one of which is that it makes old machines fly, and there are still some old 32-bit boxes out there that need all the help they can get. You can also easily add Enlightenment E24, although I like Moksha better -- e17 is still the most stable version of Enlightenment, and that's what Moksha is based on. Most of the later new features have been backported to Moksha, so you're not missing much if anything.
The best operating system I have tried for my Gateway GT5656 desktop, which I bought in 2009. It boots to a working screen in about 20 seconds, helped by a solid state hard drive. I had to install firefox however, because the old graphics on this machine cannot handle hardware acceleration. firefox detects this and adjusts by default, most other browsers don't. After that one change, it has worked flawlessly, and kept another old desktop out of the landfall. Nothing better for an old system with funky graphics. Newer systems may work fine with less-light operating systems, but this one needs Bodhi. All this, and beautiful, too!
I am running BL 6.0 on a 2009 MacBook Dual Core with 6G RAM.
I found Moksha; like any new DE takes some getting used to but any more so than my experience with DEs that I have not tried before like Xfce, LXQt etc. And definitely much easier than some other light weight DEs I tried like Trinity or IceWM
Another aspect BodhiMoksha is the defualt theme - you either like it or you hate it. There is a nice range of themes (and icons as well) available in the Bodie app center - try them all. And if you are adventurous you can find some Enlightenment themes on the Internet that will work as well. Same with icons - create a .icons folder in /home/user dir and download a few Icons sets from B00merang (Win 7 and 10 being my favorite). You can mix and theme atributes and icons in settings the Look settings as well. Moksha is quite customizable.
Light weight and fast on low resource systems was what I needed. That is where Bodhi shines. Out of the box it only take 160m of RAM. As a comparison I looked at some of the different supposedly "light" distros that I have tested in VirtualBox. I measured these systems (htop RAM) out of the box except for Bodhi Standard 6.0 which was configured with the applications that I typically use - Abiword, gnumeric, Xarchiver, gdebi firefox, firejail and several more. The htop figures for RAM were:
Bodhi Standard 6.0 185m, LinuxLite 200m, Lubuntu 233m, LXLE 319m, Peppermint 320m, Q4OS 339m, Xubuntu 499m
The only way I could get lighter than Bodhi was with IceWM as a DE. IceWM as a DE is kind of crude in an 80s style. antiX 133m, Debian 11 minimum CD (no apps) w/IceWM 147m. For me these are no really usable systems I could live with on a day to day basis.
This distro surprised me, very light and everything works easy. I used Lubuntu on old Pcs but Bodhi is better, because it is faster and lighter in the tests I did 2 old Pcs, 1 dual-core and 1 Atom netbook.
For those who don't like the default theme, I recommend trying the MokshaRadiance theme, included in the full version of the distro.
Congratulations to the Bodhi team, I will use it as the default system.
Bodhi is a very nice distro, very elegant and lightweight.
It has an Ubuntu base so plenty of software easily available.
Moksha, the E-17 based desktop environment might a bit harder for new users and its menu might not the the best categorized one but apart from this it's awesome.
There is beauty in efficiency and customisability.
I have been using it as main distro from the 2.2 version and I am really pleased with it.
I have used/tried many other distros but none of them came close to it in the satisfaction it gave me.
A fair rating would have been 9.5 as occasionally there are some small niggles, but the nice dev team tries to solve any they can.
Bodhi is truly in line with the distrowatch motto... it really is putting fun into computing. Give it a try!
I look forward for the distrowatch review of 6.0 Standard.
Bodhi 6 is so refreshing ! It is truly Enlightened Linux OS ! So light, pleasing to eyes and get job done without coming to your ways. Very minimal, for me to decide what I want and I have it via sudo apt install or synaptic. I have modern PC and still I find Bodhi 6 as good OS for its speed, simplicity and fact that is is based on long term Ubuntu supported base OS which will ensures stability and security for years. Thanks much Bodhi team for giving this the world!
Bodhi has a somewhat unique look, you either love it or hate it. It is extremely lightweight and minimalist and even manages to facelift my old and wrinkled 15 year old desktop and make it fly again.
On modern harware it is super delicously fast.
Cons:
The app center
Chromium and not firefox
A bug in the live standard iso that does not show a wifi or network icon/ nm applet. This of course can be a major turn off for newbies.
But if you are looking for something lighter and faster than the usual suspects Gnome, XFCE, KDE, Mate, Cinnamon then this "special" looking little gem might be for you.
This looks promising for resurrecting old machines. The standard version is minimal to the extreme - Chromium, Synaptic a basic text editor and a terminal is about all you get and I think that's a good idea if you just want a general surfing machine for a bedroom/spare room etc.
The DE is going to be Marmite (love it or hate it) to most, but I've always favoured the lighter desktops myself and if learning a new way of doing things is the price to pay for getting a bit more life out of old hardware, then so be it.
You probably wouldn't use it on a more modern machine, but aimed at it's target market of ancient beasts, it looks like a real winner.
Desktop: Moksha is horrendous. You click with the right button and nothing happens. Back to the old school. And green colour is...well, got no words...
Menu: boring, not functional at all. Not easy to find what you want.
Personalization: booooring and very limited possibilities
Fast? Yes, Bodhi is fast and memory it's ok. But CPU is always higher than average.
Sorry, i'm a Windows and a Linux user: i praise functionality overall. Colour effects may be good for kids but when i use an OS i want low resources consumption, light and speedy systems. If i have to struggle only to change the wallpaper or to dig till i found how to change the screen resolution, well, that's not for me.
It beats the pants off of other OSes in terms of performance. I compared Bodhi on my Core2Duo machine versus W10 on my spouse's i5-2nd generation machine (that is, 2-3 years newer than mine) and the C2D blew it out of the water: much more responsive and far more memory- and disk-efficient.
It's attractive and very usable once you set up the way you like. I like the default arc-green theme, but there are many other themes out there in Synaptic. Moksha looks and feels good. It's intuitive and lighter than most other Linux desktops out there, while looking nice and working the way it should. I would recommend swapping out the Enlightenment terminal with something like the XFCE terminal, but that's a personal preference.
I've been using it for a few months without any major issues. Any issues can be found easy, since it's an Ubuntu derivative and you won't be the first one to encounter the same thing as many others.
A minor downside is the Bodhi Appcenter: it has very few apps and it's just webpages within Gnome Web, aka Epiphany. Synaptic or sudo apt on the command line will serve you much better, though Synaptic is long in the tooth.
9/10: me likey and me keepy. It's my reliable daily OS now and for at least the next few months.
My new go-to for all things Linux.
Best distro I have found and I have tried many. Mint, MX, antiX, tiny core, easy, etc, etc, etc.
Does not load your PC down with a bunch of pre-installed stuff that you will never use.
Excellent base to build a system that you will use however you choose.
Even a noob like me can get everything up and running the way they want with very little effort.
I was a bit hesitant at first because it does not come with much, but the visuals made me want to keep going and as I went I found out how easy it was to keep going.
And the Bodhi team is very helpful. I got all my answers just from looking at their forum and wiki without having to ask additional questions.
It was worth the weight. Bodhi 7 is for me the best lightweight Linux distro in the world. It is also one of the most beautiful. The new wallpaper is so gorgeous that I can't bring myself to put anything else on it.
I have used Bodhi 4, 5 and 6, and my old Gateway from 2009 continues to age, but Bodhi 7 seems to be as fast and stable as any of the others. I didn't have to do much in the way of customization, and what I did was fairly easy. for example, I like the desktop switcher to be on the bottom panel, like in LXDE. By default, Bodhi has it on the right side. By fooling a bit with it I was able to get it where I want.
It was easy to install, and the software center makes installing other software easy as well. I always put Synaptic Package Manager on my Ubuntu-based distros. I also found Chromium too heavy for my graphics-challenged Gateway. so I installed Libre Wolf (which is a bit of work, but a few copied commands in the terminal, copied directly from Libre Wolf's website, made it a breeze). I like Libre wolf over Firefox, since it has the privacy options I like enabled by default. The new browser manager (based I believe on Zorin), makes installing browsers very easy, and there is a nice selection to choose from.
I really can think of nothing to complain about with Bodhi. I also have it on our old Dell Inspiron laptop, which runs very hot. We can't even keep the battery in it, and only run it from AC. But Bodhi keeps it from overheating.
Bodhi may straddle the line between desktop environments and window managers, but it feels much more like the former. It is unique in that respect. At least, I know of no other distro quite like it. Bodhi 7 is a Grand Slam in my opinion. Great work by the development team!
Bodhi is the lightest and still perfectly usable distoro for day to day use. Much lighter than Lubuntu and much more usable than antiX, Q4OS or wattOS. Customization with one click is one of the strengths of this distro. Themes are rich in variety and there are a lot of them. Localization is a big plus inherited from Ubuntu, but few custom apps are missing support for my language. I have resurrected several 10+ years old notebooks with this OS that serve well for seniors and kids. Overall this is my top pick for old computers.
What others have said about Bodhi -good or bad it's up to you- is true: it is lightweight (a lot), it has a distinctive theme based on their heavily customized version of Enlightenment desktop, it is very minimalist, you have to read their documentation to save valuable time when you try to configure it to your needs.
This is not a review about the pros n cons of Bodhi in general. It's about what new version 7.0.0 brings to the table in comparison to 6.0.0. and I can say from the start I'm not very enthusiastic. Apart from the more recent base-system which of course is an apparently significant upgrade (+ the hwe and s76 isos now available), Bodhi 7.0.0 features a new theme / layout that is in my opinion not as sophisticated and polished as the default theme in version 6.0.0. New plymouth animation is unremarkable. You boot up to the fresh Bodhi desktop and immediately strikes you as odd that the new theme looks not properly adjusted to the screen. It is actually off-set in all different displays (resolutions) I tried it oob. Tray icons in the notification area have irregular sizes unlike version 6.0.0. There are ways to adjust panel, icon and menus dimensions to scale better with your actual screen dimensions but do we have to? We didn't in previous versions. Isn't it enough struggling to set appearance settings and keyboard bindings with quite obsolete and unintuitive graphical tools already? It is characteristic that the new default icon-set includes fewer icons for known applications. Firefox, keypass and many other programs had their own cute green icons in Bodhi 6. No more. I would expect the reverse: adding more programs to the system icon set. So new Bodhi, although it rested in beta for quite a while, feels nevertheless rushed and rough around the edges compared to its previous incarnation. I will still keep recommending Bodhi to people who want to install Linux on old hardware yet not the newest version but the old n tried 6.0.0. Using a fitting metaphor: Final "enlightenment" is still far away. Our Linux soul will still be trapped for another cycle of existence in the vain embodiment of version 7.
Bodhi Linux is an exceptional distro! endless customization and flexibility coupled with speed and minimalism, giving you the perfect system to build on what you want.
Only distro capable of breathing life into my 10+ HP Pavilion 1600, making it feel brand new, a beast on my workstation at the office. Bodhi being based off of Ubuntu also makes it a great choice for app availability, it supplies everything i need.
The Moksha desktop environment is very easy and comfortable to use, developed in house by Bodhi team.
Features and functionality can be extended by loading and unloading modules which is very useful.
I cannot recommend this distro enough, everything just works from home to the office.
Special mention to the community who are very welcoming, always friendly, willing and helpful. The Devs for creating an easy and stable system to use, a cut above the rest.
- bloat free
- very light (free -m) 268 MB with WIFI running
- fast
- elegant, very customizable desktop
- fantastic support from the developers and forum members
- about the best if not the best documentation of the other than major distros
- Bodhi's App Center is a cut above the rest
Cons:
- you need to know what apps you want to add as this is a minimalist distro
- you need to know basic Linux maintenance or read the docs
Bodhii is a superlative niche distro. It is not intended for newbies or the CLI adverse.
Bodhi is an anti-bloat distro. The assumption gong in is the user is in charge/knows what apps they want to install and Bodhi assists with a fine selection of curated software in its App Center that is tested to perform with Bodhi.. In V7.0 you may also select from a wide assortment of browsers. Bodhi makes Installation is a breeze.
The Moksha desktop is elegant and good looking with a wide variety of themes and wallpapers available. IMO,for its weight Moksa gives you the most bang for your RAM buck in terms of looks,customization, and performance. The wide assortment of Moksha modules gives the user an easy way to add functionality to the desktop environment.
But where Bodhi stands out is in terms of documentation and the warmth, camaraderie, and helpfulness of its forum. The developers are extremely accessible, diligent,and polite. There is a family atmosphere to the forum. There really are few smaller distros that can match Bodhi in this regard, Puppy is similar in tone.
Given Bodhi is very clear whom it is suitable for, I rate it a 10 out of 10. Bodhi is a Linux distro at its finest.
It's a combination of the broken Moksha (Enlightenment) theme, still at version e17, despite e25 being the current version, the faulty GTK theme, and an icon set with the elegance of an elephant footprint.
The performance and the memory consumption are OK, but because it ships with only a dark theme, it's pretty useless. Bodhi doesn't ship with any light Moksha themes; those few on their website are either broken, plain ugly, or most often both.
There are not many compatible themes on the Internet either, and even if one does find one, there will be no GTK theme or icon set matching it. Maybe someone who doesn't care for the looks and buggy Moksha/Enlightenment might find some use for it, but I see no reason to keep it.
On the one side, one gets configuration possibilities for everything; on the other side, one gets lost in the "endless options," but one also has no option for the most basic things like setting the mouse cursor or the font size. Scaling the environment will not only make the font larger but also other GUI elements.
There is a good reason why Enlightenment distros are so rare these days.
Tried it, works good, but too much effort to set up the way I would like it. I could not find anywhere to install nvidia drivers. Linux Mint is so much easier to set up without spending all day on it. If you have got the time to configure it. Fonts are too small on high resolution monitor and I didn't like the way it looked after I increase the size. If it didn't require so much effort to configure it, I would likely give it a harder look and a better ranking. It seems to be pretty speedy, but I have a speedy computer as well.
I love the speed of Bodhi, I just can't get used to it's particular desktop paradigm( I lost some shelves while learning). It's extremely promising if they could make it a little more intuitive. I gave up, after a while(I know that I shouldn't have). Frustration just got the better of me. It is a very nice system for someone who is already familiar with linux. I don't think a beginner could handle it(YMMV). Until I get up the courage once again to dive in once again, I will go back to MX and Mint.
I used this distro on my low spec computer for 2 weeks, VERY lightweight, best part about Bodhi I must say is their community, friendly and helpful. But I have since moved on to another lightweight distro, almost feel bad about that lol since the devs of Bodhi and the community is a cool bunch and they helped me alot, but I'll couldn't get used to the workflow in the Moksha DE, but it was an interesting experience, who knows I'll might pick up Bodhi again in the future. One thing more, I wish more distros would theme their terminals like Bodhi have! Just awesome looking.
You should definitely try Bodhi, and especially if your looking for something in the lightweight area.
Bodhi is a distro that does exactly what it sets out to do, it actually hits its target. It aims to provide support for older hardware or newer hardware for users that want a minimalist approach in an elegant yet light desktop.
This is a distro for more hands on types who know what apps they want to run and know what they want in a desktop. This is not a distro for Windows only types who are afraid of a command line and ave no desire to read documentation but it is an easy to use distro with fantastic documentation and dedicated forum support. The developers are very engaged with their audience.
Bodhi is stable. lightweight, fast and elegant. The documentation is a cut above most distos as is the welcoming tone of the support forum.
It is simply the best distro: it has the base of Ubuntu LTS, but at the same time it does not have any of the problems of Ubuntu: its bugs, its snaps, etc. Bodhi is more solid than Debian itself: I've been using it since version 5 (based on Ubuntu 18) and I've never had any bugs. I have installed Bodhi 7-beta and all runs like perfectly.
You have to configure it from the beginning, as a Debian. It is heavy work but worth it. The desktop is retro and also takes a lot of work (and knowledge) to set up to your liking. It is not easy to use if you don't know it.
I don't know of any other distro that is so light and stable and bug free. The desktop allows for any functionality, although I'm not sure if it will work well with Steam. On old hardware it runs great, on new hardware it flies even faster.
My current hardware is a Lenovo that doesn't work well with Wayland or Plasma, it doesn't work well with Linux Mint or Arch either, Opensuse doesn't recognize sound. But Bodhi Linux recognizes everything.
n addition, Bodhi Linux supports and collaborates with a Mexican Distro called Escuelas Linux, which is wonderful: it is a Bodhi Linux already configured and loaded with many programs, aimed at poor schools.
I love you, Bodhi Linux, and I love you with an everlasting love, eternal flame! Good Job!
I am running BL 6.0 on a 2009 MacBook Dual Core with 6G RAM.
I found Moksha; like any new DE takes some getting used to but any more so than my experience with DEs that I have not tried before like Xfce, LXQt etc. And definitely much easier than some other light weight DEs I tried like Trinity or IceWM
Another aspect BodhiMoksha is the defualt theme - you either like it or you hate it. There is a nice range of themes (and icons as well) available in the Bodie app center - try them all. And if you are adventurous you can find some Enlightenment themes on the Internet that will work as well. Same with icons - create a .icons folder in /home/user dir and download a few Icons sets from B00merang (Win 7 and 10 being my favorite). You can mix and theme atributes and icons in settings the Look settings as well. Moksha is quite customizable.
Light weight and fast on low resource systems was what I needed. That is where Bodhi shines. Out of the box it only take 160m of RAM. As a comparison I looked at some of the different supposedly "light" distros that I have tested in VirtualBox. I measured these systems (htop RAM) out of the box except for Bodhi Standard 6.0 which was configured with the applications that I typically use - Abiword, gnumeric, Xarchiver, gdebi firefox, firejail and several more. The htop figures for RAM were:
Bodhi Standard 6.0 185m, LinuxLite 200m, Lubuntu 233m, LXLE 319m, Peppermint 320m, Q4OS 339m, Xubuntu 499m
I am running BL 6.0 on a 2009 MacBook Dual Core with 6G RAM.
I found Moksha; like any new DE takes some getting used to but any more so than my experience with DEs that I have not tried before like Xfce, LXQt etc. And definitely much easier than some other light weight DEs I tried like Trinity or IceWM
Another aspect BodhiMoksha is the defualt theme - you either like it or you hate it. There is a nice range of themes (and icons as well) available in the Bodie app center - try them all. And if you are adventurous you can find some Enlightenment themes on the Internet that will work as well. Same with icons - create a .icons folder in /home/user dir and download a few Icons sets from B00merang (Win 7 and 10 being my favorite). You can mix and theme atributes and icons in settings the Look settings as well. Moksha is quite customizable.
Light weight and fast on low resource systems was what I needed. That is where Bodhi shines. Out of the box it only take 160m of RAM. As a comparison I looked at some of the different supposedly "light" distros that I have tested in VirtualBox. I measured these systems (htop RAM) out of the box except for Bodhi Standard 6.0 which was configured with the applications that I typically use - Abiword, gnumeric, Xarchiver, gdebi firefox, firejail and several more. The htop figures for RAM were:
Bodhi Standard 6.0 185m, LinuxLite 200m, Lubuntu 233m, LXLE 319m, Peppermint 320m, Q4OS 339m, Xubuntu 499m
Been using for a while on two machines, a desktop (circa 2012) and a laptop (circa 2006).
Boots up from cold in under 30 seconds on both machines, standard ISO HDD (not SSD) installs.
Very consistent and stable, no weird unexpected behaviour, runs for months without needing a restart, suspends and resumes almost instantaneously.
Uses only 190MB RAM idle on boot. Absolutely no bloat on the standard ISO install. Though I'm not short on either RAM or disk space, efficiency is always welcome.
Have noticed some comments about not enough apps in their App Store. As it's Ubuntu LTS based, the repo has thousands of apps that the user can pick based on their preference. It's just for convenience that a handful of the most useful ones are setup so that they can be installed through a web browser. This does not limit the full selection in any way.
I prefer the default enlightenment theme and like to keep it minimal.
Last but not least, their forum is very welcoming; members and devs are very helpful. I'm not a member but do regularly check them to see what's going on and notice most questions get attended to pronto.
Credit goes to Devs for creating such a finely tuned distro. Great job guys :-). Much appreciated.
What is there to say that had not been already said! :p
Bodhi is a breath of fresh air in the "monkey see, monkey do" gnu/linux world.
Extremely lightweight and efficient distro, no bloat whatsoever just sane choices for software in the appack release.
The Moksha desktop is very fast and responsive and perhaps the greatest feature for me is the "click anywhere menu" which is such a time saver, no more wasting time looking for apps/places. Key bindings are easy and more could be added = Amazing!
Beautiful theming out of the box, extra themes are preloaded in the appack release and easy to install in standard release.
Software availability (office, gaming, music, etc) is vast, i have found everything i can possibly use in a lifetime and so easy to install by using app centre or synaptic package manager. APT in cli is available also
Bodhi is extremely stable. i have used it exclusively for all my work and gaming needs for the last 2 months and i cannot be more impressed. no restarts, nothing. It just runs!
Cheers to the Devs for their great work and dedication in creating this gem of a distro. I can not recommend Bodhi Linux enough ;)
I like the speed very much, its just the user interface could be more intuitive. If Bodhi was easier to use it would be among the top five Linux distros. Even so it is nice, especially for being minimal. I did not get the chance to see how big the software selection is because I uninstalled because I inadvertently took apart some of the desktop items and could not figure out how to restore them. It was frustrating. One day I hope to give it another shot, because as I said before the speed was nice.
It's the only one, that works on all my old machines at home! Even at the very old one's. Well done!
The first three or four recommenditions from Berlios.de wasn't able to install at all (#1-4). These doesn't work!
Bhodi gives new Life for old Notebooks.
Easy to install. Easy tu setup all important functions. Also WLan and so on. Lightweight. Quite fast. It looks very nice. Very handy. I love Moksha. It looks very modern.
Please offer more Apps in the Bhodi App Store. In my opinion, this is in other distros better made.
Incredible distro for older PCs, low-power machines and netbooks, with the only drawback to it being that it uses more storage than most OSes to install, and if you don't have a lot of space go for Puppy (which it actually uses comparable memory to!). It's relatively easy to use and the forum is helpful and friendly although aside from Moksha and Enlightenment related-issues most of the time it is not necessary as it is built on top of Ubuntu so there's plentiful resources for whatever you need.
I love Bodhi Linux. Mint is still the one I suggest to those new to Linux, but once you're used to it and want something that is real light on resources then Bodhi is a great choice.
The desktop might need more tweaking with Bodhi using Moksha but some people like it as is. I added a bit more color and replaced the panel widgets from the variety of themes available.
The Bodhi forum is great with very friendly people who are knowledgeable.
It's a 5 year distro and version 6 is good until April 2025.
It runs fairly stable, allows a wide variety of software to be installed. Never used the Bodhi App Centre, always installed manually / via APT.
Moksha desktop is ok, although the Widgets something to get used to.
However, it keeps disabling my WiFi unexpectedly which cannot be resolved other than a re-boot (yes, Windows style!).
The Forum is blocking access with a decent VPN or TOR, so that's of no help either, counter-productive to basic security.
I'm not writing it off but if you can get by w.o a forum and the occasional "hiccup", this is good for you.
After hopping and bopping countless distros I stumbled upon Bodhi 6 a couple of months ago. There is a significant learning curve if you want things JUST RITE, and I gave up on it once, but the sheer speed brought me back to spend more time and I am glad I did. It's kind of like when I bought a brand new pickup... there was nothing to DO on it, so I never really bonded with it. Old cars and trucks, yes, you work with them and bond with them or you toss them. Well, Bodhi, after a day or so of tinkering HARD, has produced a workhorse for me. Things like trying to get Google Earth running on it were not trivial with my Intel HD 630 video hardware (HP570), but, as I say, tinkering works, as long as it's not mind blowingly tough. Most other things just work. This distro is almost as fast as Puppy itself, much faster than MX or even Peppermint. I get bored when I have to boot Win 11 for some reason, with the wait times. Puppy is cool, but disasterously tough to work with for me. MX and Peppermint were fun, but MX had too many bugs for my comfort and would not boot on about half of my laptops. Bodhi has worked everywhere and is nice enough looking out of the box to just start using. SPEED and EFFICIENCY of Bodhi, along with its usability make this a KEEPER!
I like low powered computers as I use a mini box M350 fanless mini itx case with an Intel N3050 processor 1.6 ghz turbo to 2.08 ghz ,this is a nominal 6 watt processor, (my case will run fanless up to 10 watt ) I love the silence and the absolute economy of it ,compare to an i3 Intel processor nominal 52 watt ,once just a fad now an economic necessity ,i.e.less than one sixth of an average power use ! with that set up you can run a gnome distribution but it is slow but when you put Bodhi on it it will just just fly. Bodhi works really well and so many low resource distributions are no where near as low resource as they claim but Bodhi uses less than 200 of ram from the start and is a complete system ,i.e. nothing missing and with every thing that you could want from Ubuntu software. my system is mini itx motherboard with N3050 processor ( no processor fan ,no case fan and 8GB of ram and an 128 GB ssd ) = total silence and full performance,this would be overkill with 4 GB of ram.I can do every thing on this system that I can do with an i3 system that I have ,but this is the one I always use,Bodhi 6 really is the answer if you want top performance from inexpensive hardware and using less than one sixth of the power. I mostly do what the majority of people do,email ,surfing news and Linux websites ,Ebay,Spotify,steaming live TV and music,Facebook etc. I have distro hopped and tried many alternatives and Bodhi 6 is superb and streets ahead of anything else,yes it takes a while to get used to it and to understand how it works but so worth the effort, " SIMPLY THE BEST "
High quality combined with light weight. Can be used as your primary operating system without any sacrifice. In fact it might be the best choice as you want to work efficiently and not have your computer freeze up to take to much time when rendering or copying files for example. Everything worked on multiple computer installs. You can do program installs from the app center or appimages. Not an issue for running any program I have found. Ram usage very low, just a pleasure to use. I have tried other distros from Puppy (which I really like) to Lubuntu (which I like) and others like MXlinux (would not install for me). But Bohdi works and you can theme it anyway you like.
I forgot this one yesterday. I installed Bodhi on my old 32 bit HP computer. It works pretty well. I am impressed. There were a couple of bugs but the latest update has fixed everything.
I decided to give this a try just because this computer has been sitting for about 6 years doing pretty much nothing. I had an old 32 bit version of Deepin on it which I only used to download and burn iso images.
With all of the research and testing different linux distros, I wanted to see just how well an operating system can be designed to run an old machine really well. I find that this works pretty much as well as the new MX despite the limitations. For the basic computing tasks that I do, this is fine. I use e-mail, watch videos, music, etc. I haven't tried it with Skype or Zoom but I have both of those on my other 2 computers. Finding this might just be a way to actually run this computer right into the ground rather than tossing it just because it has older hardware.
If you need a simple system for an older computer, I highly recommend this.
I really like Bodhi Linux. My biggest problem with it is the lack of community support. If something goes wrong its difficult to find an answer. If it was not for this problem it would be my distro of choice hands down. The devs do a great job with this. Any linux user would would love the customizability of this distro. If the community support for this was ever to change. This would be my goto Linux distro. Clean crisp and looks great looking. A little different and takes a bit to get use to but it is worth it once you do.
2 gb ram
Pentium dual core 2.00 ghz processor
160 gb ide hdd
Radeon hd 2400 pro
I tried Bodhi on this pc and really love it. Of course sometimes feel slow because 64 bit os with 2 gb ram, thats so normal. But generally beats Windows 7 32 bit... 200-300 mb between ram usage on idle (yes in 64 bit, not 32 bit)
I can play 0 ad, Half life 1-2, dont starve together, cs source, retroarch etc...
I have 1 fps with proton. Dunno, maybe my gpu is so old for proton etc.
Windows 7 ultimate 32 bit and / Bodhi Linux 6.0.0 i like this combo in this pc.
The live boot pushes the choices you have to make down to the edge of the screen where you cant see it. So it gets hung on the language screen, trying to tab over does not work either. Safe graphics mode will get you in but then you cant adjust for your resolution while in safe graphics mode. Put the choices in the middle of the screen until the person can get booted and then adjust the screen resolution.
This is by far one of the best GNU/Linux distributions I have tried which combines the power of Ubuntu with the minimalism of Moksha creating something that is definitely a Tinkerer's Dream Come True, also with the choice of themes and the low ram usage that it has I cannot complain even if I want to
Super fast boot on hp 8530w with an SSD. Has all the customization I could ever ask for. For some reason Ricoh R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller is disabled so haven't figured out how to access my dv camera that worked ok in latest xubuntu and linuxlite. Still 6.0 is a keeper.
Superb lightweight distro. Moksha takes some getting used to, but it works. Installed the base edition on my personal laptop, and runs smoothly without any glitches. Cannot complain.
Installing on Dell XPS15 9570 without any problem
Very nice, clean and extrem fast desktop
The best bodhi-version ever, fast and stable,
Based on ubuntu lts, no more words to say for everyday users
6.0.0 HWE. Very happy, minimal instalation,but is running kernel xanmod with the page instructions, 3 windows firefox consuming less than 1.1gb, for my use is a great advance and a non brainer.
Hands down the best ultra-lightweight distro out there! It only uses about 160mb of ram idle, which is the lowest I've seen in a "just works" desktop distro other then Q4os trinity. The standard release is pretty minimal with only a number of basic applications per-installed which is a refreshing sight compared to many similar distros, this means it installs pretty quickly even on low end hardware. I mean sure, the UI can feel a bit clunky out of the box, but its pretty easy to customize. It also has a very helpful and kind discord server. My main complaint would be the lack of window snapping, and the lack of a search bar, but I've gotten around this by installing Ulauncher. Overall a excellent versitile distro that uses impressively low system resources :) 9/10
Lightweight. Quick. Stable. Highly configurable/customizable (if you take the time to learn Moksha. Friendly community on Discord and their forum. Have been using Bodhi for years as a daily driver.
this distro is wonderful, and i think this version 6.0 is much better than 5.0. Both are very fast, but I find this latest version more stable, the desktop is not misconfigured as before, it is modern and fast, and personally I love the icon themes that it brings by default, but more cheerful themes can be installed with a click . You have to build it little by little, but I have not had stability problems unlike other Ubuntu-based distros.
A beautiful distro that puts you firmly in the driver's seat. A lot of thought and great taste has clearly gone into the theming, icon sets and general appearance. The distro follows a minimalist approach only installing what is needed to get you going. Then you decide what apps you want to build the system you want. As a long time Arch Linux user this approach is greatly to my liking. because the distro is based on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS you also have all the Ubuntu packages available to you. The Settings Panel gives you a ton of options to tweak and customize the system precisely to you liking.
After using the distro for a week on an 11inch screen Lenovo Ideapad I have found it to be stable. I find myself reaching for the little Ideapad more and more often rather than my main laptop which runs Arch. So basically you have a beautiful, tastefully designed, stable, minimalist and highly customizable distro.
The only flaws I have found so far is the vast number of notifications you get. They don't get in your way since tou have to open the notification gadget to see them and you can turn them off in the Settings. Also my function keys don't work. But that seems to be an Ubuntu thing since they don't work in Ubuntu 20.04 but do work in 20.10.
Quirky, but extremely stable with great support. Many cool features for such a lightweight distro, once you figure out how to use them.
One of the first things you'll want to do after installing, is go to Settings in the Notification gadget, then go to the History tab and blacklist EPulse, so you don't get a notification pop-up every time you change the volume.
Bodhi has been slowly but steadily climbing the DistroWatch ladder the last few months and I expect the trend will continue if people give it a chance.
I've been using Bodhi Linux on my 2007 & 2013 iMacs since 4.0. For the work I do, this distro is my favorite. It is quick. The minimalist approach is nice. It doesn't come with a lot of apps I'll never use.
Other than a few system tools, I only use Firefox, Thunderbird and LibreOffice Writer for correspondence. Printer setup was quick and easy. The PCmanFM file system is very quick. Now that I'm used to it, I find that it works quite well for me.
I installed 6.0 HWE on my 2007 iMac about a week ago. Both machines are set up exactly the same. Transition to the Thunar file system was easy. So far there have been no issues. I'll upgrade the 2013 machine soon.
Actually I enjoy the Moksha desktop. The default green is not to my liking. Thankfully it is easy to change to a different theme. For me it's a plus the desktop isn't easily cluttered. I prefer keeping everything put away when I'm finished working.
Hopefully this distro will be around for a long time.
Una buena distribución ligera con Soporte Dual monitor con 2 GPU gracias a Moksha.
XFCE no soporta dos GPU varias distros ligeras la usan y es incomodo para lo que usamos Dual GPU monitor
Bodhi Linux Simplemente Funciona, Instalar lo que necesites es muy sencillo al estar basado en Ubuntu es muy facil.
Un consumo de Ram de 220-300MG es demasiado ligero y funcional sin sacrificar tanto.
Tenia una Ram dañada con varios BSOD en Windows 10 y varios bloqueos en Ubuntu y MX linux
Bodhi Linux simplemente continuo trabajando normal con muy pocos fallos ahora que logre como Usar BadRam trabajo sin problemas.
As long as you're prepared to get used to this distro's somewhat "different" interface - it's a very very good operating system, one of the best out there.
I am running BL 6.0 on a 2009 MacBook Dual Core with 6G RAM.
I found Moksha; like any new DE takes some getting used to but any more so than my experience with DEs that I have not tried before like Xfce, LXQt etc. And definitely much easier than some other light weight DEs I tried like Trinity or IceWM
Another aspect BodhiMoksha is the defualt theme - you either like it or you hate it. There is a nice range of themes (and icons as well) available in the Bodie app center - try them all. And if you are adventurous you can find some Enlightenment themes on the Internet that will work as well. Same with icons - create a .icons folder in /home/user dir and download a few Icons sets from B00merang (Win 7 and 10 being my favorite). You can mix and theme atributes and icons in settings the Look settings as well. Moksha is quite customizable.
Light weight and fast on low resource systems was what I needed. That is where Bodhi shines. Out of the box it only take 160m of RAM. As a comparison I looked at some of the different supposedly "light" distros that I have tested in VirtualBox. I measured these systems (htop RAM) out of the box except for Bodhi Standard 6.0 which was configured with the applications that I typically use - Abiword, gnumeric, Xarchiver, gdebi firefox, firejail and several more. The htop figures for RAM were:
Bodhi Standard 6.0 185m, LinuxLite 200m, Lubuntu 233m, LXLE 319m, Peppermint 320m, Q4OS 339m, Xubuntu 499m
The only way I could get lighter than Bodhi was with IceWM as a DE. IceWM as a DE is kind of crude in an 80s style. antiX 133m, Debian 11 minimum CD (no apps) w/IceWM 147m. For me these are no really usable systems I could live with on a day to day basis.
The best operating system I have tried for my Gateway GT5656 desktop, which I bought in 2009. It boots to a working screen in about 20 seconds, helped by a solid state hard drive. I had to install firefox however, because the old graphics on this machine cannot handle hardware acceleration. firefox detects this and adjusts by default, most other browsers don't. After that one change, it has worked flawlessly, and kept another old desktop out of the landfall. Nothing better for an old system with funky graphics. Newer systems may work fine with less-light operating systems, but this one needs Bodhi. All this, and beautiful, too!
I've been interested in this distro since the days of MacPup, but did not get it to work on any hardware I had until 5.0. I've happily used 5.0, 5.1, and now 6.0 on nearly every machine I've had my hands on, and have it on two machines right now.
I understand Robert Wiley's reason for having chromium as the default browser, and it's a good one. That doesn't mean I have to use it -- Anyone who wants Firefox can add it easily.
The settings are still a royal jumble. It is difficult to figure out what some of them do, and some of the names are quite similar. I'm not ready to use this distro full time, but I use it as a stress relief from Mint or other distros I have to use to get work done.
Robert is still working on the 32-bit version of Bodhi 6, but it should be out soon. This is a lightweight distro for a large number of reasons, one of which is that it makes old machines fly, and there are still some old 32-bit boxes out there that need all the help they can get. You can also easily add Enlightenment E24, although I like Moksha better -- e17 is still the most stable version of Enlightenment, and that's what Moksha is based on. Most of the later new features have been backported to Moksha, so you're not missing much if anything.
This distro surprised me, very light and everything works easy. I used Lubuntu on old Pcs but Bodhi is better, because it is faster and lighter in the tests I did 2 old Pcs, 1 dual-core and 1 Atom netbook.
For those who don't like the default theme, I recommend trying the MokshaRadiance theme, included in the full version of the distro.
Congratulations to the Bodhi team, I will use it as the default system.
Bodhi is a very nice distro, very elegant and lightweight.
It has an Ubuntu base so plenty of software easily available.
Moksha, the E-17 based desktop environment might a bit harder for new users and its menu might not the the best categorized one but apart from this it's awesome.
There is beauty in efficiency and customisability.
I have been using it as main distro from the 2.2 version and I am really pleased with it.
I have used/tried many other distros but none of them came close to it in the satisfaction it gave me.
A fair rating would have been 9.5 as occasionally there are some small niggles, but the nice dev team tries to solve any they can.
Bodhi is truly in line with the distrowatch motto... it really is putting fun into computing. Give it a try!
I look forward for the distrowatch review of 6.0 Standard.
Bodhi has a somewhat unique look, you either love it or hate it. It is extremely lightweight and minimalist and even manages to facelift my old and wrinkled 15 year old desktop and make it fly again.
On modern harware it is super delicously fast.
Cons:
The app center
Chromium and not firefox
A bug in the live standard iso that does not show a wifi or network icon/ nm applet. This of course can be a major turn off for newbies.
But if you are looking for something lighter and faster than the usual suspects Gnome, XFCE, KDE, Mate, Cinnamon then this "special" looking little gem might be for you.
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