[COLUG] Seeking recommendations for Linux distro for ancient laptop

[Ethan Dicks]

Hi, all,

I have this ancient Dell laptop that has suddenly become my primary
Linux box.  It's had an install of RedHat 9 on it since 2003, but
since it is maxed out at 256MB of RAM, is a bit sluggish when browsing
with Firefox, opening OpenOffice files, etc.

I would love to upgrade to a newer laptop, but that's not practical
for 4-6 months.  I have to make do with what I have in front of me.
Does anyone have any recommendations for lightweight distros that are
sophisticated enough to run a graphical web browser and OOffice?  Disk
space is not a limiting factor here, neither is raw CPU speed... it's
only physical memory limitations that's really giving me fits here.

Thanks,

-ethan