A/v only,ratings do not matter.

I have installed xp on many older laptops people buy at yardsales ranging from p133's to p300's, with 128mb ram. It is no problem except waiting for 32x cdroms to read the cd lol.

I would say your best bet is to turn off all the visual eye candy, and learn how to trim your services way way down. The laptop I use with most is an old Micron p300 with 128mb ram and xp pro sp2, because the batterly life on it still beats out my new mobile cpus. I code on it and use internet. Sure you won't get that instant response like a new computer, but I would hardly say it is unusable.

IMO the best av for this type thing WAS f-prot, but the old version no longer has updates, and the new version I don't know about.

Keep your running processes to a minimum and shave the eye candy, and you might be able to get better av performance.

I have given dozens of computers to people for next to nothing. I have bought them from the schools for $5 when they get rid of them, OS and all. I even bought 10 nice 1.2g machines with xp pro oem keys for $10 each last year. Another place is community colleges and large businesses. Often they offer older machines to employees who don't want stuff that old, and they gladly give them away or charge very small price instead of paying to have them taken somewhere. You can check resources like these out and then strip down machines for upgrades.

Sul.

 

I use Dr.Web without mail guard, and it's usually around 6-10mb of memory usage(scheduler+2 spidernt processes). This doesn't decrease protection at all but is less memory consuming.

 

sorry i was a bit harsh earlier.
i think linux would be your best bet.
i would reccomend drweb without the mail scanner. but since you said free av i would reccomend doing a custom install of avast with just the resident scanner and on demand scanner. aka no mail scanner,no web scanner etc.
avast needs at least 64mb of ram and reccomends 128mb according to their website.
i know enough people have said it but i really think that upgrading the ram would be a good idea.

 

Avast with only standard shield uses currently about 18mb of memory on my laptop.

 

I applaud your actions! Realistically, what is the need for an AV on a computer for a child (age unknown)? Will it be used to access the internet or only to play games locally, view cd's, etc.? Any sensitive data on computer which could be compromised by malware?

Rob

 

The above post has me thinking way outside the box. If the OP is pursuing AV solely for internet protection (and we don't know for sure), then how about no AV at all and instead go with something like Sandboxie (about 450kb)?

 

can you play games with this machine? well i guess not.
as for the av i think Avast standard and network
shield

 

Thank's to all who gave input.I found what I needed from it.ps. XP Home work's very well on 128MB ram.Tweak it,lol.

 

Lol,thank's but it runs fine,tweak,tweak,tweak!

 

Your last 2 different post say 2 different thing's.Thank's but no thank's.ps.XP running great here.

 

Thank's again!

 

dok,why delete your post?

 

avira is the lightest AV software i've used, and it's also free, perhaps your best bet

 

Well, I guess it depends on the level of games - I imagine it is adequate for children's games and entertainment software?

 

maybe nod 2.7. but my god., these days computer has lots of ram. i think the least i can see is 512mb