Ideal distro for a 486
 

Hey, ive been gritting my teeth finding a good linux distro that i can use on a 486 for fun and maybe programming / learning linux. Ive been suggested red hat 5.0 and at the official site there are no iso files for this version?

So um im wondering of a decent linux distro that is a iso file that i can burn to a cd, and install for 486 requirements.
Also, to install it off a cd, i might have to do it on another pc since my 486 cant boot from cd's, is this ok? Or is there a way to boot from a disk which then boots from the cd? Or am i better off getting a distro that fits on a few disks?

Thanks.

I would suggest Debian. It's the most compatible Linux you can get ... and besides that it doesn't use up a lot of HDD space, etc.

I got a redhat for dummies book that solved the problem of not being able to boot from CD with a file you copy to a floppy from the CD(installation boot disk) and then you boot from the floppy to run the CD. I imagine most distros include something similar.

Debian is good, but has a steep learning curve. It's worth it though.

The current Slackware will run well on that thing as well and I think it is a lot easier to learn. I have it running quite well on a 486DX-100 with 32 Megs of RAM.

Personally I don't like old software, unless you really have to run it. If you are trying to learn, you might as well learn the newer stuff anyway

Hopefully that 486 has a fair amount of memory in it. 8-16 megs will run the non graphical "text" mode well, but forget X11 unless you have at least 32 megs, then still forget the "fancy wm's like KDE and Gnome, use Blackbox, WindowMaker, IceWm, or Xfce instead. Also forget Mozilla and use Opera, dillo, or browsex instead.