Help for Linux on bare-bones 386

[jethro at dds.nl (jethro)]

The first time I tried to install linux, it was on a 386 with 4MB and two 
40MB hard disks.  It didn't work out (couldn't get past all the 
segmentation faults) and it stayed a dos machine until someone gave me a 
486 motherboard with 8MB of RAM which is still in this machine.  At that 
point I had a 100MB hard disk, and that configuration was definately 
useful.  So with that as my background, let me see if I can answer any 
questions:

Op Mon, 4 Jan 1999, Bill Horne schreef:
> I've a 386 with 8MB Ram, 5.25 floppies, a 40MB hard drive, with a
> monochrome monitor. Please tell me if it's a viable platform for 
<snip>
> 2. Can I run a word processor (like emacs) or a spreadsheet on it if 
> I use Linux?
I found Emacs to take up something like 5-10MB of hard disk space (I 
forget now) so I deemed it not worth it.  That's not going to be 
comfortable on 40MB.  I don't much about spreadsheets, but I can't 
imagine it being that small.  But the real answer is yes, if you could 
fit it on the hard disk.

> 3. Since the machine has no CD-ROM, what options do I have for
> obtaining/loading the software?
Without a CD-ROM, this is not fun.  The simplest solution is to download 
a distribution onto floppies and install from there.  When I tried to 
install it on that 386, I wound up with 20 disks (and each one takes 
about 10 minutes to download from a computer lab in a university).  I 
picked up a 4xCD-ROM for $20 at the MIT flea market; a week later 
a store was selling 16x for $30.  The CD player is worth it for the 
install alone.  Of course then you have to invest in a distribution CD, 
although it's worth it in my opinion.  Or you can borrow it from someone, 
one of the joys of GPL'd software.
 
> 4. Will I need more RAM or hard disk?
I still have 8MB and it goes okay.  Compiling programs can take a while; 
I can run X but not do much without a lot of hard disk thrashing, but for 
most things I don't notice.  I would definately get more hard disk, though.
A basic install that included gcc and perl but not emacs or X (what my setup 
was) took up 60 MB.  You can probably get a 200MB hard disk cheap; they 
sold them at the MIT flea for $10, but that won't happen again until 
spring, but I am sure there are other places you can find them.  Also 
beware; they're kind of used and junky, I found a 1GB there for $10 but 
when I took it home it refused to work.

> 5. How much of a learning curve will an experienced DOS user have in
> stepping up to Linux?  My sister has never used a "point and drool"
> interface, so she's used to using a command line, but I don't want to
> give her a system that's going to need several months to master:  she
> has five kids and little spare time.
To be honest, I'm far more familiar with unix than dos.  However, I would 
think for basic things, it should be simple, ie copy-cp, dir-ls... 
although I was in for a shock the first time I tried to get my new system 
to read a floppy disk (mount /dev/fd0 /mnt I would have never guessed, 
and I couldn't find this information anywhere when I first looked for 
it).  However, there is a lot more to learn, but it isn't really 
necessary.

> 6.  How much of a learning curve will *I* have to climb in order to get
> this system working?  I have used UNIX at school, and know the basic
> commands, but I haven't programmed in years and have never assembled 
> an OS from source.  What time commitment should I plan for?
I thought I knew enough about unix before installing linux, but I 
overlooked the fact that you have to do some basic system 
administration.  It's not too much, though, and there is lots of 
documentation available.  If you are already familiar with tar and gzip, 
you should be mostly fine.

My overall recommendation:  for that particular machine, leave it as a 
DOS box.  If you get a larger hard disk and a 3-1/2 floppy drive (I have 
a spare floppy drive I can give you) and really want to do this then go 
for it.

For recycled machines, I would have at least 8MB RAM and a 100MB hard
disk, with CDROM (even if only borrowed for the duration of the install,
and returned afterwards) and 3-1/2" floppy.  I have never seen linux
successfully running on a 386, so I suppose that's a recommendation in
itself.  A smaller hard drive is possible, but then you wouldn't have
enough space for applications such as emacs and other miscellanious stuff. 
And don't forget a swap partition!  At 40MB, using 8MB of that as swap 
will seem like a huge amount.

Also, as far as various distributions are concerned, I would recommend 
Slackware over Redhat for small hard disks.  I tried to get Redhat to do 
a "minimum install" which well exceeded my 100MB hard disk, whereas that 
60MB install came from Slackware.  I haven't used other distributions so 
I can't really comment on them.

Hope that helps
jethro
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