Thread: all this chatting about linux, what can be done with a 200mhz machine?

damn small linux is amazing on old hardware. if you have more than 128mb ram, the entire os can be loaded into ram. I have it running on an old server (100mhz w/128mb ram) , and all of the applications load faster than my 2.5ghz celeron w/ 512 mb ram with windows xp. (no, its not bloated with malware ) (I have a dual boot, windows for games and my girlfriend. debian for everything else) i would highly recommend damn small linux for your old computer, the installation process is easier than every other linux distro that i have installed, including ubuntu. installing damn small linux on your machine shouldn’t take too long, but it will be allot faster if you do it this way:
take an old hard drive, and temporarily put it into your newer pc. download a damn small linux live cd, burn the iso, (if your not familiar with burning iso images, google it, as you cannot just copy the files to cd in xp without special cd burning software) and do a frugal install in the old hard dive. if will tell you that you have to reboot, instead, power down and pop the old hard drive back into your old machine and boot. the instillation will finish. dsl is the best small distro that i have used, although it is tough to tailor to your needs. (removing applications, etc)if you really want to optimize your old hardware, go with linux from scratch. you could make your system really damn fast, and functional again, especially if you have one specific function in mind. (just a web browsing pc/ text editor/ music player, a file server, a carputer, or a home media center)

200mhz eh.... well i heard the processor makes a GREAT drink coaster.. seriously you could prolly use something like DSL then the command line if you dont mind the bit of the wait you could prolly get X TWM or X and a bare bones interface.. but if you want to do anything serious.. you need more than that

I just fired up a 300mhz PII board today that would die under windows years ago.
Not my board, but one that a family member had tried to get the system fixed many many years ago. Well, I dug this thing out, put a dimm in it, connected a bad drive, and whooolah put DSL on it, works great !!!!

DSL ( Damn Small Linux ) is great for old boxes. It's the ONLY Linux distro that I have found that will run fast (like a P4) because it's been optimized.
They have also been working on a DSL2 type of thing, that has many other features from the get go..

ALSO, DSL runs fast on old boxes (Pentium 1 + ) and just runs on older (486 etc ..) NOT WITH COMMAND LINE, but with a desktop etc ... and a nice looking one too.

Something like Suse would be an absolut DOG, cuz it's way bloated.

Don

don i say command line because its all in what you do with X... i ran DSL on a 1.33 GHZ machine and X would choke on its own cock every time soo its all a matter of what you do ;P

Originally Posted by kraft

OT: Lol TheLlama just help yourself, i found this while searching things related to linux on the net, this one is not my creation.
Would be nice to find someone which is able to do a kind of resin inclusion of this logo, it could look then like the plastic epia's logo

Not anymore... you changed your avatar.

I like the unix based OS... As an option and from experiance using a 200MMX (P1) I used win2k with good results.

Food for thought and not as a 'better' option just an option. I bet the performance is not as good as DSL.

If you're going with CLI (Command Line Interface) not to be confused with CLIT (Command Line Interface Terminal) learn how to use screen. Screen will let you run more than one program from the command line. So you could be using irssi chatting on irc in one screen and copying files in another and running nano in yet another. Though with 200 mhz you're going to be stretching it to do many things at the same time. :P

EDIT: And I use archlinux. It can be pretty small or as large as you want it. I can't remember what the minimum foot print is.

Sorry to bump an older thread, but I have another question on this subject. I just discovered linux distributions for Ipaqs at www.handhelds.org. They are supposed to be able to run a full linux system with GUI on about 32mb, with a 200mhz processor. I don't know if these would port to a standard computer, but it would be interesting to try. Even on an old processor that would load fast. Anyone have ideas about this?

I once had a $50 HP pc that I bought from a lady moving out of the country... I threw in two nics, installed slackware 7.1 WITHOUT GUI - and I used it as a firewall for like 2 years. My best uptime was like 290 days and the only reason it wasn't higher was because I was getting tired of how stable it was and i wanted to play with it some more! lol!

I used that as a firewall to protect another pentium 200mhz webserver that i was running. at the time, i used to do a ton of ebay auctions and i hosted all of my own pictures right on that 200mhz machine ;]

just make sure that you have a good amount of ram in that machine - you can pick some up on craigslist or ebay as long as people aren't over charging you for it. You should pay like $5 or (reluctantly) $10 for like 256mb or more.

Almost ALL Linux distributions have command line mp3 players. that's a good starting point for ya. you can look into... maybe a "nicer command line but gui" mp3 player but i can't name any off the top of my head right now...
- sh00k