DSL on old computer

Forum: Other Help Topics
Topic: DSL on old computer
started by: james2nd

Posted by james2nd on Sep. 03 2006,20:01

hello
This is an all new experiance to me. I have an old gateway P75
pc, with 32mb of ram & 697 mb HD. Its got W95 on it at present but I would like to know if I could download dsl on my new pc ( win me ! ) & save to disk then load it on to the older pc ? will that work & what else do I have to do to make it opperate correctly i.e. I have heard partitions mentioned & lots
of other abbreviations. thanks if someone would be kind enough to guide me through the process.

Posted by Nick-xx on Sep. 06 2006,01:33

Quote

Its got W95 on it at present but I would like to know if I could download dsl on my new pc ( win me ! ) & save to disk then load it on to the older pc

About that think i think it will work, and why it shouldn't work, but will be a little slow using 75mhz. The minimum that will make it reasonable IMHO is 200mhz, and 32mb of RAM is barely sufficient to use, because i have 57MB of Ram and its already spend 27MB of ram in the main desktop of fluxbox without running any program. You can always use swap file if your HD is fast enough. Now the process to load it i think is spreaded in this forum.

PS: Sorry for my bad english.

Posted by lovdsl on Sep. 06 2006,02:12

Sounds like a fun project..have not used a gateway board but p75 with 32 meg ram and 600+ hd is doable.

partitions can be useful if you want to add a swap file or install to hd on a bootable partion..this link may help

< http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Partition/ >

you can search this forum with the search button near the top of the page.

ie: < http://damnsmalllinux.org/cgi-bin....sfer+hd >

DSL is very versitile and can run on lesser equipment but if you want to run X desktop and add extensions there will be some limitations naturally, for example I installed to a dx2-66mhz with 32 meg ram and ran x but I did not attempting to play a dvd on it. I do however play them on a faster machine..enjoy the project

< http://reviews.cnet.com/5208-66....2035895 >

< http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/talk/node/63 >

< http://linux.sys-con.com/read/244333.htm >

Posted by james2nd on Sep. 08 2006,21:46

Thankyou for the replies
Yes I managed to download & burn onto cd, but on trying to load onto old 75mhz gateway it didnt work went into bios & there is not an option for booting from cd just floppy. So after a bit more investigation I found out to download a bootfloppy.img from ibilio.org which I saved to desktop But on sending it to floppy it informs me the file is to large although it is 1.4mb on checking the floppy's capacity it said 1.38mb. So i'm stuck again anyone with an answere ? thanks.

Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Sep. 08 2006,22:02

Quote (james2nd @ Sep. 08 2006,17:46)

So after a bit more investigation I found out to download a bootfloppy.img from ibilio.org which I saved to desktop But on sending it to floppy it informs me the file is to large although it is 1.4mb on checking the floppy's capacity it said 1.38mb.

I hope you just didn't copy it over as a file.

Did you use dd (or rawrite)?

You could also use a grub boot floppy, or others like sbm.

Posted by james2nd on Sep. 09 2006,07:47

hi
I saved the file to the desktop then just sent it to the floppy! I didn`t realise that may not be right, so maybe it could be explained thanks james2nd

Posted by rja on Sep. 09 2006,20:56

If you want to create the bootfloppy with a Windows OS,
then you can use "rawwrite".

The Wiki is the best place to find this kind of info.

< http://damnsmalllinux.org/wiki/index.php/Boot_Floppies >

Posted by james2nd on Sep. 09 2006,21:00

Now! not only am I incompetant at making floppy but it seems I havn't downloaded dsl properly either, I think this, because I have just recieved my copy of ubuntu 6.06 and it didn't boot up my evesham pc on which I have just installed a new MB & 1800mhz duron, so I went dubiously into bios and set it to boot from floppy/cd/hdd, and to my utter astonishment and whoops! of joy it booted up ubuntu and I had a little play. Then I thought I would try the dsl cd that I had burned with Adaptec but alas it did not boot.javascript:emoticon('

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smilie so it seems I need some more advice please.
dispondent james2nd

Posted by james2nd on Sep. 09 2006,22:05

okay
I just doanloaded rawrite and used to write to the floppy which appeared to work although I have yet to see if it boots my old 75mhz gateway, but I am still waiting to try in the morning. zzzz

Posted by Trog Dog on Sep. 10 2006,07:11

Quote (james2nd @ Sep. 09 2006,17:00)

Now! not only am I incompetant at making floppy but it seems I havn't downloaded dsl properly either

You may not have burned your boot cd properly. Check these instructions to be sure - < http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/wiki/index.php/Burning_a_Bootable_CD >

Posted by james2nd on Sep. 12 2006,21:30

Yes
you were right trog dog I downloaded CDBurnerXP which seemed much better than the old adaptec software (which I uninstalled)and tried burning the current iso again but because I wasn`t shure on the iso No`s I probably chose the wrong one & consequently it didn`t work either, so I downloaded another cd burner(BURNCDCC) then downloaded another copy of the CURRENT ISO and burned it onto a new cd. And yes it works OK on my evesham & my HP upgraded to XP. BUT when I loaded it onto the 75mhz Gateway yes it loaded up but did not seem to work properly, the screen did not show any icons and it was very fuzzy, I did wonder if the screen resolution may be wrong. So I`m left in a dillema any ideas ?
thanks anyway J2