I have a really old computer that my dad brought home from work. It is a 200 MHz Pentium Pro with 64 MB RAM. I want it to run as a hardware firewall. I have 2 ethernet cards installed in it and I have a 30 GB hard drive and CD-RW drive in it. I want it to have a graphic environment as well, but GNOME and KDE run way too slow on this thing.

Any suggestions are appreciated.

Thanks!

Mike

I'm running Vector Linux on a P120 laptop with 144Mb memory, using XFCE.

I'll be trying Kate in the next couple of days.

Ok, I'll try that. If Kate works well, let me know!

Mike

If at all possible, you should up the RAM on it, otherwise you shouldn't have any problems; I've got a P133 laptop w/96MB of RAM & 6GB HD running XFCE, and it works fine (although FireFox tends to bog it down some.) It could be hard finding memory for that computer, though... Might want to bug a local used computer place and see if they have any laying around in back

I ran Vector on a box with 64M RAM and it performed quite well for an old box (cvs sever, web server, etc).

It's interesting. I tried Ubuntu live on such box, but it even didn't come up. Certainly it needed more memory. Unfortunately my hardware limits memory to 86MB. So, I'll try Vector next.

Hello,

Okay, okay, sorry for saying this again, but Vector is awesome for having a desktop on older systems.

However, I would personally go for Slackware if you are putting together a dedicated firewall. Slackware is more versatile and can be more easily custom-configured. Vector is actually just a toned-down Slackware focused on having a Linux Desktop.

For example, in Vector, you need to install the entire OS, whereas in Slackware you decide exactly what you want. Partition is more customized in Slackware too.

Good Day,
Murdock

Slackware seeems inpossible to install for newbie. I got Slackware iso distro, I could handle 1 question what kind of keyboard, but after nightmare started.

I am trying to install Vector 5.1 STD on exactly the same spec laptop right now. Toshiba 500CDT P120, 144mb ram, 2G HD, but I can't seem to finish the install.

First try, everything was installed, but at almost 100% I ran out of space, I had given 1GB to the root partition but maybe it wasn't enough.

Second try, it can't finish the install, after random periods it stops because it can't read the cd.

Did you use the standard kernel? Or the SCSI kernel, or something else? I have a feeling that I am just missing something obvious?

Anyway, thanks in advance to anyone who answers

I am running Smoothwall 2.0 on a Pentium 100 with 32MB RAM 1GB hard drive. I had to add a swap file for one of the latest patches.
If you really want to run just a firewall, either Smoothwall or IPCop are very good. Read the documentation before and after installation.
They are minimal systems with just what is needed. They have a web interface you can use from another computer on your home network.

My Vector 5.1 install is using about 1.3GB.
My DSL hard drive install is using about 200MB.

Debian could also be a good choice.

As others said before, if this is for a dedicated firewall, Smoothwall or IPCop are the ones to use.

Alol you have to do is read the prompts. If installing Slackware, just make sure KDE is not one of the packages

I tried it, too. It booted and then stopped at a brown screen.

Oh well... I'm going to try Vector right now.