Hi all,

I come across tons of computers that are the older kind.
They generally are P2-233 with 64M of ram and 2G hds.
Windows 95 runs fine on this type of machine but it seems
that Linux as it moves forward is slowly abandoning this
level of hardware. The software requirements are not
large just Internet browsing, emailing and word processing
spreadsheets and a few presentations are all that is
desired. For anything that requires more horsepower the
machines can link to a server. Even Xubuntu gives the
feedback "low memory model" when installing to a
machine with these specs. Has anyone out there had
good luck with a particular distribution or configuration?
Please give experience.

thanks,
charles.....

"***** charles" <shultzjrX@sbcglobal.net> writes:

>Hi all,

>I come across tons of computers that are the older kind.
>They generally are P2-233 with 64M of ram and 2G hds.
>Windows 95 runs fine on this type of machine but it seems
>that Linux as it moves forward is slowly abandoning this
>level of hardware. The software requirements are not
>large just Internet browsing, emailing and word processing
>spreadsheets and a few presentations are all that is
>desired. For anything that requires more horsepower the
>machines can link to a server. Even Xubuntu gives the
>feedback "low memory model" when installing to a
>machine with these specs. Has anyone out there had
>good luck with a particular distribution or configuration?
>Please give experience.

>thanks,
>charles.....

You could try Damn Small Linux It was developed for just that sort of
situation.

But 64 M memory really is pretty tiny. Upgrade to at least 128 ( eg
canibalize one to get the memory for the other).

Note that Windows abandoned that level of harware ages ago, and in fact you
are violating the law by running Windows on those machines as I am sure you
do not have a license from MS to do so. Ie Windows has also moved on.

Bill Unruh writes:
> Note that Windows abandoned that level of harware ages ago, and in fact
> you are violating the law by running Windows on those machines as I am
> sure you do not have a license from MS to do so.

He may (or may not) be in breech of his contract with Microsoft (if he has
one) but it is a bit extreme to call that "violating the law".
--
John Hasler
john@dhh.gt.org
Dancing Horse Hill
Elmwood, WI USA

On 2007-06-04, ***** charles <shultzjrX@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>
> I come across tons of computers that are the older kind.
> They generally are P2-233 with 64M of ram and 2G hds.
> Windows 95 runs fine on this type of machine but it seems
> that Linux as it moves forward is slowly abandoning this
> level of hardware.

No it's not. Certain distributions are abandoning this level of
hardware.

> The software requirements are not
> large just Internet browsing, emailing and word processing
> spreadsheets and a few presentations are all that is
> desired.

I'd suggest Slackware.

--keith

--
kkeller-usenet@wombat.san-francisco.ca.us
(try just my userid to email me)
AOLSFAQ=http://www.therockgarden.ca/aolsfaq.txt
see X- headers for PGP signature information

In message <87lkezuaqu.fsf@toncho.dhh.gt.org>
John Hasler <john@dhh.gt.org> wrote:

> Bill Unruh writes:
>> Note that Windows abandoned that level of harware ages ago, and in fact
>> you are violating the law by running Windows on those machines as I am
>> sure you do not have a license from MS to do so.
>
> He may (or may not) be in breech of his contract with Microsoft (if he has
> one) but it is a bit extreme to call that "violating the law".

I don't see why he needs to be in breach of anything - that generation
PC was shipped with 95, 98 or NT4, so could still be running the
original, licensed copy.

--
Alan Adams, from Northamptonshire
alan.adams@orchard-way.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.nckc.org.uk/

"Alan Adams" <alan.adams@orchard-way.freeserve.co.uk> wrote in
message news:8568d7ed4e.Alan.Adams@orchard-way.freeserve.co.uk...
> In message <87lkezuaqu.fsf@toncho.dhh.gt.org>
> John Hasler <john@dhh.gt.org> wrote:
>
> > Bill Unruh writes:
> >> Note that Windows abandoned that level of harware ages ago, and in fact
> >> you are violating the law by running Windows on those machines as I am
> >> sure you do not have a license from MS to do so.
> >
> > He may (or may not) be in breech of his contract with Microsoft (if he
has
> > one) but it is a bit extreme to call that "violating the law".
>
> I don't see why he needs to be in breach of anything - that generation
> PC was shipped with 95, 98 or NT4, so could still be running the
> original, licensed copy.
>
> --
> Alan Adams, from Northamptonshire
> alan.adams@orchard-way.freeserve.co.uk
> http://www.nckc.org.uk/

I do in fact have legal copies of all the Windows/M$ software I use
from MSDOS 1.0 all the way through Vista on the client side and
a few versions of Server. That is not the thrust of this thread. So
far it is one for DSL and one for Slackware. I started with Slackware
way back in the early 90's and I thought that even that distro has
gotten a little blotted for "small" machines. I have also tried DSL
and I wasn't totally happy, don't remember why. I just installed
Xubuntu on a small machine and it turned out that the hard drive
was bad but it still completed the install. It took 8 hours however.
I will be throwing out the hd and replacing it with a newer one and
reinstalling. The two characteristics that the machine has to have
in my scenario are: must boot to a cdrom and must have a net
connection. It is tuff to get both of those on a real old laptop or
Pentium 1's so I stick to P2's and higher. Under these conditions
I may try Debian Net Install since it is rather minimal.

thanks for the feedback,
charles....

On Mon, 04 Jun 2007 12:16:03 +0000, Unruh wrote:

> "***** charles" <shultzjrX@sbcglobal.net> writes:
>
<snip>
>
> But 64 M memory really is pretty tiny. Upgrade to at least 128 ( eg
> canibalize one to get the memory for the other).
>
I agree that RAM is the critical factor. You might get a usable system
with 128M if you are careful about which apps you run. The system
becomes quite usable with 256M RAM. That way, KDE, GNOME, OpenOffice,
Mozilla will run fine. I would also cut off CPU speeds slower than about
500MHz. Slower hardware may be good for other purposes, though (file
servers, routers).

BTW, I am writing this on a Celeron 800 with 256M that I saved from the
trash (via EBay). That is enough to run Gnome, Open Office, Mozilla, etc.
My usable system spec is just above your threshold for junk.
Unfortunately, the lower spec (with 233MHz and 64M RAM) is not appropriate
for running the full set of desktop software, IMO. Look for motherboards
to salvage with can accept 256M RAM.

--
Douglas Mayne

"***** charles" (shultzjrX@sbcglobal.net) writes:

> So far it is one for DSL and one for Slackware. I started with Slackware
> way back in the early 90's and I thought that even that distro has
> gotten a little blotted for "small" machines.

If you think it's bloated, then you don't understand the distributions.

They all pull the kernel, utilities and applications from the same pool.
The difference is what they select from that pool, and the philosophy
of the distribution.

If there's bloat, then it's because the various parts, ie the kernel,
utilities and applications, have bloated. There's nothing a distribution
can do about that, unless they use old versions, which likely isn't a good
thing.

If they streamline the kernel, then that will make it smaller, but not
by that much and given the kernel is a relatively small (though admittedly
vital) part of a distribution, making it smaller isn't going to do that
much. But it will limit the hardware that the kernel can run on, since
much of the "bloat" over the past 15 years has been about dealing
with more and more hardware.

The fact that a given distribution has loads of software is not really
bloat. You do not have to install it all, but at least you have the
option.

Damn Small Linux obviously comes in a relatively small size, but
it lacks all that isn't included. It is setup to use limited
hardware, but there's nothing special there to do that, ie they
don't write new software in order to fit on old hardware. They
simply select lean stuff. That lean stuff is on at least many
of the "bloated" distributions.

People ask for a distribution "for old hardware" and just like
any time someone asks about what distribution, they'll get the
same canned responses. So they believe the hype about Vector Linux
("intended for older hardware") when there isn't anything there
that a bigger distribution doesn't have, it's simply a subset of
a larger distribution.

If something is "bloated" then you use a leaner desktop and you
use leaner applications and you only install what you need.

Michael

In comp.os.linux.setup ***** charles <shultzjrX@sbcglobal.net>:
> Hi all,

> I come across tons of computers that are the older kind.
> They generally are P2-233 with 64M of ram and 2G hds.
[..]
> desired. For anything that requires more horsepower the
> machines can link to a server. Even Xubuntu gives the

This way please:

http://www.ltsp.org/

You can perhaps run some apps local if you like.

Good luck

--
Michael Heiming (X-PGP-Sig > GPG-Key ID: EDD27B94)
mail: echo zvpunry@urvzvat.qr | perl -pe 'y/a-z/n-za-m/'
#bofh excuse 76: Unoptimized hard drive

In article news:<TwR8i.13169$RX.2657@newssvr11.news.prodigy.n et>, *****
charles wrote:
> I come across tons of computers that are the older kind.
> They generally are P2-233 with 64M of ram and 2G hds.
> Windows 95 runs fine on this type of machine but it seems
> that Linux as it moves forward is slowly abandoning this
> level of hardware.

I managed to install Debian ("Sarge", I think it was) on a machine with
exactly that spec (IIRC I had to boot DSL from a liveCD first to create a
swap partition). It runs OpenOffice under KDE -- just -- but has only about
100MB for user data.

This was an experiment, though, and if I were intending to use linux (or
anything, nowadays) on that machine I'd upgrade the hard drive and RAM.

I think it would be usable as it is with DSL, though, if that's not too
limiting for you; as it probably would with "puppy linux" which is also
well thought of despite the stupid cutesy name.

Another possibility would be to use Gentoo ... but you'd have to build the
system on a more powerful PC and install from packages on the P2. Gentoo
needs something like 10GB of disk space to build, and building on a P2/233
would take about a fortnight (depending on the packages you wanted).

Cheers,
Daniel.