It only takes 1.3 GB if you install every package ever invented. A normal installation of TeX Live takes about 200 MB and includes all the binaries (including tex, pdftex, xetex and luatex), a full LaTeX and ConTeXt and a whole bunch of other libraries.

I usually just install that, and then tlmgr any missing packages instead of downloading a gigabyte of TeX code I'll never need.