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Promit
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Joined: 15 Nov 2003
Posts: 344
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 Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 7:55 pm Post subject: How to install Gentoo on an extremely old system? |
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First, let me show you the system specs:
Original Purchase date: 1992 (upgraded since then)
HDD size: 1 GB
CPU: Pentium 1 133 MHz
RAM: 64MB, via 4 sticks of 16MB. Asbolutely not upgradable.
No PCI slots; they're all ISA.
Has an ISA network card, not really sure what company/chipset
Video card, unknown company, 4 MB video ram, unlikely to have hardware OpenGL or Direct3D.
Some sound card, who knows what the hell it is.
Now, I want to do a Gentoo stage 1 install on it (time is of no consequence, I'm aware this will take like a week). The main things I'm worried about are the RAM and the HDD. I know the install docs say that Gentoo has been built on 64 MB + 64 MB successfully; I'll use either that or 64 + 128. The other thing is the hard drive. Builds need space, and lots of it. Can I get a basic system running under these conditions (eventually) ? I'm planning to run Fluxbox as the WM, so hopefully that will work without too much trouble...and should I do anything special to pull this off?
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NeddySeagoon
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Joined: 05 Jul 2003
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Location: 56N 3W
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 8:15 pm Post subject: |
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Promit,
You need a CD too.
ISA network cards are a pain especially if they are plug and pray and have been used that way. If they have jumpers to set I/O port, IRQ and DMA they are much easier to use.
If the network card is jumper free, then you will need the manufactuers set up discs. Usually still available on the web.
You will likely have to start the network manually and pass parameters to the kerenel module so that it will talk to the network card.
I don't know hown much will fit on a 1Gb drive.
Have fun.
Regards,
NeddySeagoon
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Promit
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Joined: 15 Nov 2003
Posts: 344
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 8:28 pm Post subject: |
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I have a CD-drive  slow but it works.
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Random Task
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Joined: 31 Mar 2003
Posts: 171
Location: Canada
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 8:36 pm Post subject: |
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I would really be interested in this as well. I can install windows 98 on this machine and it runs (not well) but it runs. Can I fit a minimal gentoo system with xfree + a wm? My hd is a little bigger, 1.5 gigs!! WOHOO
I will be starting this soon so if I don't get any advice I will certainly post my findings  ah the power of linux.
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curtis119
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Joined: 10 Mar 2003
Posts: 2160
Location: Toledo, Ohio,USA, North America, Earth, SOL System, Milky Way, The Universe, The Cosmos, and Beyond.
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 9:21 pm Post subject: |
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You are going to have a very difficult time installing Gentoo on this machine if you are planning to compile things. I would use a GRP (Gentoo Reference Platform - all the software is precompiled) CD to install. IF you're planning to use this box as a server of some kind then it will run great! I have a similiar box running as a bridge on my home network. If you're trying to use X then .... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA
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Seriously though, Good Luck.
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Promit
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Joined: 15 Nov 2003
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 9:41 pm Post subject: |
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Talk about gratuitous bullshit.
Somebody delete his post.
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Corw|n of Amber
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Joined: 08 Aug 2003
Posts: 221
Location: Socialist Sovietic Republic of Belgium
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 9:51 pm Post subject: |
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Not delete, just censor it a little so that he appears less silly...
wait... I didn't say that.
Seriously, it's gonna suck on that hardware. As a server, yeah, right, gotta love long ping times, too... maybe as a router (and a hardware router would do it better, too).
Only use for that : server for things like DHCP/DNS/POP3 where the response times may be up to 60 secs with no real problem... or file server, if you're the one who likes to take his time (one megabyte/sec *is* painful, trust me).
Or maybe toy box to play with software, like having gotmail write to an exported /var/spool/mail/user, for example...
But, fer [insert name of entity worshipped by your sect here]'s sake, if you compile it, put the HD in another box and chroot to it, toherwise you'll suffer...
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Promit
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 9:59 pm Post subject: |
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I don't need the box, I don't even care if it sits there for a week just compiling. It's sitting in my basement, headless and very lost, not to mention NT 4 chokes on install, god knows why. So I figure, hell let's try to put Linux on the poor thing. I'll probably SSH into it finally, anyway. Hopefully X Windows will run sort of, so then I can use VNC, but even that's not that important.
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Corw|n of Amber
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Joined: 08 Aug 2003
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Location: Socialist Sovietic Republic of Belgium
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 10:09 pm Post subject: |
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| Promit wrote: | | I don't need the box, I don't even care if it sits there for a week just compiling. It's sitting in my basement, headless and very lost, not to mention NT 4 chokes on install, god knows why. So I figure, hell let's try to put Linux on the poor thing. I'll probably SSH into it finally, anyway. Hopefully X Windows will run sort of, so then I can use VNC, but even that's not that important. |
You don't need VNC... if I were you I'd just export a display and run app on the old box that are displayed on the other  (I do that from office box to home box when I must run Windoze)
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airflow
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Joined: 14 Dec 2003
Posts: 173
Location: Vienna, Austria
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 10:45 pm Post subject: Re: How to install Gentoo on an extremely old system? |
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First of all I would like to state that I do not consider a Pentium class processor as "extremely" old... Nevertheless, installing Gentoo on such a maschine can be a serious PITA if you are not aware how long it will take. I have to admit that I wasn't.
| Promit wrote: | | time is of no consequence, I'm aware this will take like a week. |
It will. Believe me, it will. It is espacially annoying when you have to recompile the kernel several times because you always forgot some configuration for proprietary laptop-hardware.
regards,
airflow |
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slais-sysweb
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Joined: 14 Jun 2002
Posts: 221
Location: London
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 11:18 pm Post subject: Re: How to install Gentoo on an extremely old system? |
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| Promit wrote: | First, let me show you the system specs:
Original Purchase date: 1992 (upgraded since then)
HDD size: 1 GB
CPU: Pentium 1 133 MHz
RAM: 64MB, via 4 sticks of 16MB. Asbolutely not upgradable.
No PCI slots; they're all ISA.
Has an ISA network card, not really sure what company/chipset
Video card, unknown company, 4 MB video ram, unlikely to have hardware OpenGL or Direct3D.
Some sound card, who knows what the hell it is. |
64mb is plenty, and 133Mhz is fast enough. I have 4 servers with similar spec running Gentoo and built from stage 1. It will be perfect as a test box for web development. All you need to add after the stage 3 is Apache, PHP and MySQL and screen. It will take about 72 hours of solid compiling but your time actually sitting in front of the box setting up will be no more than for any other Gentoo install -- maybe less as you won't be tempted to sit waiting for something to finish when you could just get out and come back next day.
Take out the sound card you won't need it. Video is unimportant, you only need a local monitor and keyboard to check for boot problems.
The best ISA network cards are the 3com 3c509. You can find the setup tools on their website to turn of plug and play.
An install of Gentoo with AMP will need about 900MB so if you have a second hard drive it for /var and /tmp that would be good. If only using 1GB then make /boot no larger than really needed for the kernel and grub config say 8MB or 1 cylinder. Swap should be 2*64, Use one partition for everthing else, or you will find you don't have space in the right places when you emerge update.
Also you can save possibly as much a 150MB by setting up /etc/portage/rsync_excludes and removing from /usr/portage everything you won't be needing. Just putting games-* in rsync_ecludes will save a lot of space If you emerge -pv first you can check what packages are required, anything else should be listed in rsync_excludes and removed from /usr/portage. You need to check this from time to time as packages get moved and dependencies change. If emerge fails because of ebuild cannot be found then that probably means an adjustment to the excludes and a emerge sync. After an emerge sync check the dates of the directories in /usr/portage, if the date is note that of the latest sync then it is probably excluded, but not deleted: delete it or, if required, include it.
Once you have completed stage 3. emerge screen. You can then run everything headless. SSH in, run screen, emerge apache mysql php, ctrl-a d to detach the screen, logout, come back in 24-48 hours, SSH again screen -r and all should be done.
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Promit
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Joined: 15 Nov 2003
Posts: 344
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 11:29 pm Post subject: |
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What does screen do?
Finding it in the package database is going to be a real bitch, and I'm not on Gentoo right now...
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Corw|n of Amber
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Joined: 08 Aug 2003
Posts: 221
Location: Socialist Sovietic Republic of Belgium
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 11:46 pm Post subject: |
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* app-misc/screen
Latest version available: 4.0.1-r1
Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ]
Size of downloaded files: 817 kB
Homepage: http://www.guckes.net/screen/
Description: Screen is a full-screen window manager that multiplexes a physical terminal between several processes
| SVEN wrote: | What does SCREEN do?
SCREEN explained by Sven
SCREEN allows you to switch between programs and yet use just only one "terminal". So you can write texts, look at emails and newsgroups, read webpages, download files, all at the same time - but with a window for each program.
SCREEN shows one window at a time - all other windows are hidden. And if you need to see several programs in the same terminal windows, well, there's the "split" command which lets you split the terminal into several horizontal subwindows...
---snip--- |
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Promit
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 11:51 pm Post subject: |
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Nevermind, got it.
Last edited by Promit on Thu Dec 18, 2003 12:02 am; edited 1 time in total |
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MagicMonkey
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Joined: 17 Dec 2003
Posts: 37
Location: UK
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| Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 11:59 pm Post subject: Screen |
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Screen is really nice - basically, you're just logged in as normal but you can press a magic button combo (ctrl-a d) and "detach" the login so it's completely in the background. As far as (most of) the system's aware, you're still logged in and running stuff, but you can log in again and "re-attach" to that screen and carry on as it was before. It's really handy for starting long compiles at work, detaching the screen, then going home and re-attaching to find the compile finished (or the error message which it was left with...)
Sure, there's other ways of doing this, but screen is the nicest I've come across |
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Promit
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| Posted: Thu Dec 18, 2003 1:49 am Post subject: |
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You know what? Let's really really get wicked with this.
I'm going to boot off a Knoppix floppy, go into the Knoppix CD that way in text only mode (XFree doesn't work), set up distcc on Knoppix, use my other Gentoo system with distcc to compile the code as well, and install the entire thing like that, with distcc and such.
I'll let you guys know how this turns out...
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curtis119
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Joined: 10 Mar 2003
Posts: 2160
Location: Toledo, Ohio,USA, North America, Earth, SOL System, Milky Way, The Universe, The Cosmos, and Beyond.
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| Posted: Thu Dec 18, 2003 3:34 pm Post subject: |
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| Promit wrote: | Talk about gratuitous bullshit.
Somebody delete his post. |
SORRY if I seemed like I was making fun of you or being "gratuitous" I actually gave you some good tips. GRP is a very good way to install gentoo on an older system. I also gave you an example of how I am running a similiar box in my home network. The HAHA was about X and it's need for a lot of speed to run in any kind of acceptable fashion.
Again, I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings. It was unintentional.
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Installing Gentoo
