Hi,

I only have my phone as a computer because I gave my ex my last computer.

Well..I have one more and I'm sticking to it.

It's a IBM Thinkpad 380XD with 98MB of ram and a 233Mhz CPU.

How do I install Slackware on this? It won't boot to the CD. I know I have to make a boot diskette on a floppy but where do I find the image?

I hate to be a pessimist, but I don't think that that machine has enough moxie for any relatively recent Slackware. Slackware v. 10.x might possibly run on it, though slowly, but it's so old you probably shouldn't try for security reasons.

You might want to take a look at AntiX, and even it is likely to be problematical with that small amount of RAM.

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As much as I like Slackware, I have to agree with frankbell.

I would try Tiny Core or Damn Small Linux on this machine, as they are optimized for very low amounts of RAM. Don't expect any fancy window managers, though.

Personally I use Slitaz on an old Thinkpad T21 and it's blazingly fast, but may already be too much for your machine to handle.

You can also take a look here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightw...x_distribution

I was afraid I was going to hear that
.
But, does AntiX have a boot diskette?

The only thing I need is the dillo browser and mutt email client.

Hi:

You can find the .iso image of Slackware on this page. It's the first choice on that page.
http://mirrors.slackware.com/slackwa...re64-14.2-iso/

Looking at the requirements for Slackware you have enough RAM but I don't think your processor will have enough driving power.
http://www.slackware.com/install/sysreq.php

You may want to consider other light weight Linux distributions that are better suited like frankbell suggests.

You could also try Puppy Linux:-
http://puppylinux.org/main/Overview%...%20Started.htm

Linux Lite, Lubuntu and a few others you could choose from.
http://www.linuxandubuntu.com/home/5...-old-computers

1 members found this post helpful.

K. Mandla's blog has lots of good information about running Linux on low-RAM, Pentium 1 machines:

https://kmandla.wordpress.com/

A sample project: https://kmandla.wordpress.com/2010/0...enbox-in-12mb/

1 members found this post helpful.

Do you want the .iso image or the boot.img?

The .iso is here:
http://iso.mxrepo.com/antiX/

Create a floppy from the disk image:-
https://www.debian.org/releases/stab...h04s03.html.en

Slackware 8.1 - 9.1 would probably run pretty well on that generally, things like Mozilla even from those old releases will be slow on that hardware. Close all the ports with iptables and stop any services but the essentials. Security will still be a huge problem, those old browsers have many bugs. Maybe make a separate user account only go the the most highly trusted sites (provided they will work anyway).

I honestly would give up on that unit. If you shell out a few bucks you can buy a used (newer than yours) Lenovo Thinkpad on ebay that will run Slackware64 14.2 just fine. I have a used Lenovo T410 that has an i5 cpu @ 2.40 GHZ and 4 GB RAM. Slackware runs very well with XFCE on the unit.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/Lenovo-Thinkp...gAAOSwj85YQIOb

Reality just hit.
I was thinking going all CLI with..
Lynx web browser, Mutt email client, WPA supplicant for wireless ( I put a 10/100 pcmcia card in) and news feed. That's all i need. Nothing more. I'm frugal.

Or icewm with Dillo?

This will work fine with my hardware right?

Go with AntiX core libre iso if you wish to follow these instructions.

http://antix.mepis.org/index.php?title=Frugal_install

But I doubt if any modern kernel will even boot on that machine.

My oldy Compaq 1540DM linux install instructions from 2008
The cd needed help to boot a iso. I guess all you have is a floppy. No pcmcia usb card? to boot off of usb pcmcia? With floppy help?

http://yatsite.blogspot.com/2008/09/...indows-95.html

http://yatsite.blogspot.com/2008/10/...on-compaq.html

If just wanting Links browser. I shoe horned a Blue Flops install on a p66 hz , 12MB edo ram Kapok laptop like this and actually surfed the internet with it.

Edit: Blueflop install is terminal only. No Dillo or Fluxbox or Icewm or JWM.

You better have a netgear 16 bit pcmcia wireless b card if talking like you do about wireless on that old unit also.

Old gear like that cannot handle 32 bit pcmcia cards.

I think that Slackware 13.0 was the last version of Slackware that had a kernel that would boot on a machine with less than 128MB RAM. I have used gPXE burned to CD to boot machines with 64MB RAM as PXE clients so that they could then contact a PXE server on the LAN. There are Etherboot floppy disk images included with Slackware 13.0 under usb-and-pxe-installers

If you could access a second machine that could boot from a Slackware 13.37 or later install disk, then you can have a temporary PXE server, which could serve the Slackware 13.0 source files.

So, technically feasible, but the resulting performance will likely lead you to preferring your phone.

I have a FDD and a CDROM. My PCMCIA card is a Intel 16bit 10/100. Does AntiX have a boot diskette?

I am going to look into Blueflop but AntiX is also interesting.

I know in my heart of heart that this PC can serve my needs. Oh yes..

Here's a pic of all of the files that are contained in the AntiX .iso:-
http://i1052.photobucket.com/albums/...5_19-11-44.png
In the boot file are 2 files.
One says bootx64.EFI that's 1.3 MiB and grubx64.efi.

From what I can tell a boot.img can not be copied to a diskette you need a program for that.

https://www.debian.org/releases/stab...h04s03.html.en