Setting Linux on old machine
 

Hi everyone,

I would like to jump into Linux but I need a bit of help. I have an old machine that used to barely run Windows/98. I have formatted the drives and it is now empty of everything.

Here are the specs:

Pentium-S 200 MHz
262,144 KB of memory
Drive 1 : 2560MB
Drive 2 : 850MB
CD reader : 12X
Colorado T3000 tape drive
Floppy 1.44

What distribution can be used on a machine like this. I was told that DSL was probably the fit. But what do I have to do, what files do I need. I once tried Fedora, but it did not fit.

Thanks for any advice,

Bernard

DSL, Puppy, Slackware. All of those would probably work.

I'm running from the demo/install CD of MEPIS, which needs about 2Gig to install, so it should fit (barely) on your HD.

If you have a Goodwill (thrift store) PC outlet in town, you might be able to pick up a larger, empty, used HD. I've purchased a few different HDs from time to time, and they cost about $4.99 for 2-6 Gig. Even if you don't have such a store locally, perhaps you can just get an IDE drive on Ebay or elsewhere. They're extremely cheap, and apparently any IDE drive will plug in where any other IDE drive used to be (ime, anyway). You shouldn't have a problem using MEPIS 6.5 (32-bit), other than that.

asplus, you have enough disk to install Mepis. And with 256 Mb ram your PII 200 should be quite fine for Mepis 3. Boot from a live Mepis cd and click install me on the desk top ( I hope you know the password for booting). If you have created partitions delete all partitions on your 2.5gb disk. ( for this you will have to run QT Parted in the install dialog box.And then create a single prtition for the whole disk . here is something I forgot to inform billy and malay, my apologies boys, - you have to commit each operation, for this click devices on the tool bar and select commit on the drop down menu. only then will the operations carried out) once you commit, your QT parted window should show an Ext 2 partition with its size. Go back to install and your newely created partition should appear in the frst row ( install on devices). Don't bother allocating partitions for/, /usr etc. Mepis will auto allocate.click next and it will ask for confirmation. cofirm and your Mepis installation will begin. But with an X12 rom the installation may take a long time ( more than an hour and a half). Post install it will ask for languages and time zone set them and reboot. your linux is ready Enjoy it and let us know. ( you can even use the other disk (850 Mb) for win 98 and have a dual boot system . But for this you will have to install win 98 first and then Mepis. Good Luck.

Mepis is probably too resource hungry in its default configuration. He'd need a new WM/DM...Flux or XFCE probably, though I sadly have no experience with either.

Try Zenwalk, Wolvix, MEPIS AntiX.

These are all XFCE Desktops. And all have Live CDs.

Wolvix has your choice of using either XFCE or Fluxbox at login.

Just to point out that antiX has fluxbox and icewm, not xfce.
There is a testing version of antiX with xfce (see antiX site), but it is barebones. There is also an antiX-base.iso of 180MB with fluxbox, and the idea is to use this base to install to hd and then build up your own distro either using default Debian Lenny, or if you prefer Debian Sid.