Hi,
I'm newbie here. Can anyone help me, where can I download RHEL 4.9 x64 iso installer.

redhat enterprise linux 4 is SO OLD even redhat with it's 10 YEAR life support no longer even supports it

the current RHEL is RHEL 7.0

and you NEED to buy the required support contract to install software
https://www.redhat.com/wapps/store/catalog.html
buy the license and install it

Thanks John_VV. Rely need that RHEL version to test old application. Also do I rely need to buy the license even if I will use it for testing only.

there are NO security updated to 4 any more

contact redhat sales and install 4.9 on a VM
i would use RHEL 7.0 and use redhat's KVM to run rhel 4.9 in a virtual environment

...which is totally pointless. Since RHEL 4.9 isn't used/supported any longer, and won't work with new hardware, why bother? Your 'old application' that you need to 'test' may work on one old box, but until you UPGRADE the application to work on new hardware/OS, it won't be of much use, will it?
You get a 30 day evaluation period for free. After that, you need to pay for it, or load CentOS instead, which is 99.x% identical, but FREE.

Again, using an ancient OS is not a good idea for ANYTHING.

The support cycle for Red Hat is 13 years. Not 10.

That's next year. It is nearly at the end of the extended update support phase. There are still security updates, log in to your customer portal and look it up.

Or, look at: https://access.redhat.com/support/policy/updates/errata

You can email customerservice@redhat.com if you do not have an active Red Hat account.

While that may be true, security updates do not necessarily mean FEATURE updates, or updates of anything else. Installing it on new hardware will still be challenging, if possible at all. And if you want any CURRENT software on that box, good luck, unless you want to install pretty much EVERYTHING from source.

Putting a system into production using a VERY old OS is pointless. You can still *TECHNICALLY* get updates for Windows 95, but would you really install a new system using it? I'm sure you've heard the same store before in your professional life many times..."We NEED this old xxxxx system!!!!", because they don't want to spend $0.05 upgrading, and the users don't want to learn a new version. They won't do it unless you force them to, and when they do, they typically are happy about it. Old software needs to be updated or discarded.

Unfortunately, companies have to stick to what works sometimes, because it takes time to rewrite/refactor code to work on a new operating system. The government is very slow moving to replace working software and hardware. See any current missile silo to see this in action.

I'm not saying its good or bad, it's just a reality. That is why Red Hat still offers security updates and bug fixes, which will keep software running for as long as possible. And for this type of long term lock-in, feature updates are unnecessary.

A windows desktop is a different case. Every day there is something new, and some reason to update your computer to realize new abilities, to consume ever newer products.

A server sometime does one function, statically, forever. As long as it does that, there is no reason to update its 'features'.

In the OPs case, im guessing he has to bring up an environment for an old program. He probably can't grab a bunch of programmers to refactor it, so the easiest solution is to grab RHEL 4.9 and get it working. Which is totally possible, and Red Hat still supports it if he needs assistance.

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I understand what you're saying, and agree. There are many things that don't get upgraded...but should be. A server may not need an update, but if you stick a box in a back room and forget about it, that's dangerous. It WILL fail at some point in the future, and you're dead in the water at that point.

The OP 'testing' an old application on an old OS is, in my opinion, pointless. Aside from the aforementioned reason of "might not work at all on new hardware" reason, the 'test' in itself is meaningless. They obviously already KNOW the application works on 4.9, which is why they're after it. So it doesn't need 'testing'. And this is a NEW installation...wouldn't it be better to 'test' the application on something CURRENT, so they know what needs to be fixed?? The whole exercise is a waste of time.

The app is old; it needs to be updated, whether they like it or not.

1 members found this post helpful.

red_spiderman: have you spoken with your development team about getting the application to work on something newer? What is the actual reasoning behind getting and using RHEL4.9?

Actually, i have old version of rhel on my archive but it cannot installed on new server because of drivers dependencies and the minimum distro that can be install to the server is rhel 4.9. Also already suggested to install old rhel on VM, but my team won't let do it...

Hi Guys,
Thanks for the suggestions and comment. Really appreciate it. I will just use VM to install lower version RHEL 4.