I got an old laptop with low computing resources (an Intel atom and 4 GB of ram, it had 2 GB originally). It had Windows 7 Professional but it is extremely slow. I'm installing Debian lxqt, but I still don't test it.

What linux distribution would you recommend me that can work with low specs computers, and with a friendly interface like the windows one?

We use Fedora, with the Cinnamon desktop. Get it here.

I can only find a 64-bit version though, they may not support 32-bit any more, but not sure.

When installing linux from live USB the installation get stuck at 22% when installing the system files, but the USB light keeps blinking in a repeated pattern.

We use Fedora, with the Cinnamon desktop. Get it here.

I can only find a 64-bit version though, they may not support 32-bit any more, but not sure.

After Fedora live start its components the screen stays black and the USB light stop blinking.

Any of the "basic construction" systems that don't come preloaded with lots of stuff. Debian is okay choice, so is Arch and some others

The desktop you choose (that is the user interface you get) matters a little, but not quite as much as you might think. Plasma (considered one of the most resource consuming desktops for Linux) will run well on your system with 4GB, even with all the graphics effects on. (It will with 2GB too, but you'd wipe out the 2GB right away the moment you open a browser with few tabs in "modern" websites... For the record. i have right now Plasma and only Lighting Gallery open, and the system uses about 440MB)

However, by coincidence or not, the "basic construction" systems are also the ones that do need some messing with in order to install and manage, including some knowledge of the system and terminal work. (The everyday use is always in the desktop, and the desktops are the same). I invite you to dive in and not fear from this - It isn't a big deal in terms of being hard or complicated, and you get to have power you wouldn't get with most "easiest" systems

If you choose Arch or Gentoo, i can help you in particular as i know them fairly well



If there is no particular message what went wrong with the install, it's hard to guess what keeps it stuck at 22%. The message might be written in the background to a log file, or you might be able to restart the installation manually in such a way that will capture "invisible" error messages. That's sorta example of what i meant - If you do the task manually you'll get to know better,in this case why/whether something fails

I think the problem is that the laptop is too cr*ppy for modern linux, it is one of those infamous netbooks, from 2012. It originally came with Windows 7 starter, someone installed Windows 7 Professional, but it is extremely slow with the last OS, so I want a lighter system, for my mom can use basic things like web browsing and text processors by an easy way.

I could only install a Debian version without user interface, but that's useless for my purposes. When installing Debian from the live usb the computer gets frozen at random moments of the installation until I remove the power and start all over again.
With fedora the live doesn't even start, it goes black screen after all the components are loaded.

I don't want to install ubuntu because it requires way too much resources for a minimal work, so there would not be any improvement.

There are just too many distributions for test one by one, I just need a distribution that can run smoothly on 1GHz and 1GB of ram.

With Windows, half the memory (1GB in 2GB systems, 2GB in 4GB systems, over that it dicreases) is used by doing absolutely nothing!

Modern Linux systems with all desktops run well on PCs more than 10 years old (With RAM upgrade). This is not a problem

If linux should run and install there should be something wrong with the laptop... 

Modern Linux systems with all desktops run well on PCs more than 10 years old (With RAM upgrade). This is not a problem

If you can get a 32-bit version. Older PC's are almost certainly going to be 32-bit but many Linux distros are now stopping this and only supplying 64-bit versions 

Do you have a download link to a 32 bit distribution that could work on my PC?

Sadly not. I've just discovered that Fedora stopped 32-bit support with v31 and we're now on to v33. So unless you can find a distro that still does 32-bit, you're stuffed 

I must say I'm distinctly unimpressed, Linux was to me all about repurposing old machines, but they seem to have gone against this now. On the other hand, a decent quality 64-bit laptop is easy enough to find on eBay, we have three Dell E6430 machines here, the cheapest of which cost around £75 or so if I recall.

The thing is that I want to make that laptop someway working instead of destroying it, we got that laptop for free from someone who wanted his data backup. At the moment I could only install a distro without user interface, and that's useless. And due to all the linux distros, looking for old versions like v31 fedora is not an easy task. 

Do you have a download link to a 32 bit distribution that could work on my PC?

I just searched t'interweb and found this link that might be what you're looking for.

I just searched t'interweb and found this link that might be what you're looking for.

The computer gets frozen when in the part when it installs in the harddrive, both in the live installation and the OEM installation. Is it normal? 

It even gets frozen with compatibility mode, seems like I will need to destroy the computer anyways. 

I swapped the 4GB memory to the original 2GB one, and it is running smoothly and the installation seems to work!  8;

The installation succeeded! I'll try to put the 4GB memory again. Thank you very much for your help and for searching a distro for me!