Linux speed questions? Options

[Maccabee]

So there are a few categories for linux distros. The smallest ones are DSL and puppy linux and the most popular are probably debian and ubuntu.
But what are the fastest distros? Are smaller ones faster? So is puppy linux and dsl probably also the fastest as well as the smallest?
And I noticed you can run ubuntu on a computer without installing it but can you do that with puppy linux, dsl and debian? Cause i want to try them to see if i like them but not install them. Also does anyone know if you can do that with windows 7? Cause i downloaded the beta but I dont want to install it over linux if I dont like it.

[heyo-captain-jac...]

DSL and Slackware tend to run the fastest.

And you can usually do that with any OS, but it gets tedious with some. Some operating systems take hours to boot from a cd, and I imagine something as bloated as Windows 7 would take a while to start up.

Edit:

Also: Yggdrasil will fly on any machine under 15 years old. But good luck finding a download, there hasn't been a new release since '95.

[Maccabee]

DSL and Slackware tend to run the fastest.

Then DSL would prob be the best for what im looking for cause its also small.
But its kinda weird. Its not gnome is it? Cause you right click the desktop for the menu. Ill just download and it and run it off the live cd. And does it actually say D*** small or just DSL?

[mipadi]

But its kinda weird. Its not gnome is it? Cause you right click the desktop for the menu.

No, DSL doesn't use GNOME -- it uses the Fluxbox and JWM window managers, which exhibit the behavior you describe.

Actually, that raises a good point: it's kind of hard to characterize one distro as "faster" than another. All distros use the same kernel (the Linux kernel, dur), so when comparing performance, you're really just comparing the performance of the user-level software. Fluxbox and JWM are both more "lightweight" than GNOME, so systems running those will appear to have better performance -- but I can use Fluxbox on Ubuntu or Debian, too, and get the same performance boost.

Another point: I personally use Gentoo, which means I have to compile all the software I use; which means the software is tailored to run on my system (assuming I set the right compiler flags, which I do, obvi ); thus, my performance is likely equal to or superior to the default setups of most distros, even "small" ones like DSL.

Final point: "small" distros are tailored to run on older systems, or other resource-constrained systems. If you're pulling out hardware from 1998, DSL will likely run better "out of the box" than, say, Debian; but if you're dealing with new-ish hardware, you'll likely see very little difference. (And, of course, Debian can easily be tailored to run on old hardware just as well as DSL.)