Moore's Law postulates that computer hardware doubles in power every 18-24 months; hardware become obsolete at an exponential rate.

Where do you live? Do you have access to Craigslist/Freecycle/Goodwill/thrift shop/recycling center/friends-family-coworkers who just got a new computer for Christmas? It may be possible to significantly upgrade your hardware inexpensively or possibly free.

Another factor to consider is cost-of-operation; for a very old computer, simple tasks such as file-serving might max out the hardware capabilities; on modern hardware, file-serving can run as a background task while you are doing something else, and modern computers often have advanced powersaving features and the cost-per-cycle is lower. For example a used EEE PC from Craigslist could be used as a file-server with built-in battery backup and drawing less power than a light bulb.

Anyway this blog has some suggestions for older hardware: http://kmandla.wordpress.com

http://distro.ibiblio.org/tinycorelinux/faq.html#req

http://distro.ibiblio.org/tinycoreli...reenshots.html

http://distro.ibiblio.org/tinycorelinux/install.html

http://distro.ibiblio.org/tinycorelinux/intro.html

http://forum.tinycorelinux.net/

User Manual

I might have recommended something else like AntiX for the

but you can install Tiny Core on it also. I am a firm believer since you are unfamiliar using a Linux distro to learn maybe TinyCore first real well. Then you can move on to other distros if you so wish. TinyCore has a vibrant community and have pretty current packages for apps also. It was based on Damn Small Linux but is still being maintained where Damn Small Linux is not.

This distro should cover all your old PC needs. Don't forget to make a /swap partition for each install also.

Good Luck and Happy Trails, Rok

Just finding out that Linux isn't all that it's cracked up to be. And find information on how to install it is not written that well. I've found allot of information on how to run it within windows. Which is fine. But not what I wish to use these spare computers for. I like the GUI's on most of them.. (Screen shots). I've downloaded DSL,Puppy,Xubuntu,Ubuntu, PartedMagic <- which is the only one that actually boots from a CD. But I've yet to find instructions on how and what you do, to get the software on the HD. I mean, the last commands I ever used was in DOS. C:\copy D:\ doesn't work, in linux.

"All it's cracked up to be" and "meeting your expectations" may be two different things! All I can say is that the rewards go to the persistent, so don't give up. I agree there is a significant deficit when it comes to one of Linux's promises: keeping older computers useful and productive. It is definitely a challenge, and the learning curve is much steeper when you combine learning a different computing environment and trying to make it work on old hardware. If you have access to newer hardware for learning your way around Linux systems it will help you gain confidence to tackle the computer regeneration projects.

I'm finding there is a kind of sweet spot for modern stable distros like Slack, Debian, or RH, matched to hardware that is maybe 3 to 6 years old. By this age, most of the device driver issues have been worked out but performance is still reasonably high. Also such machines will be much cheaper than newer ones and only marginally more expensive than older ones factoring for usability (indeed if time is money they are cheaper).

From there you can just do security updates and have a solid low-maintenance system for another several years. Or you can keep updating the OS and try tweaking it and stripping it down to make it leaner and faster for a high-maintenance learning experience.

Ok.. Here is friday. It's ether figure out what I did, wrong or am doing wrong. So I can get these Old PCs working. Or they will go into the garage. I'm not installing Linux on my $1000 PC, just to find out if it works. Granted, it may work better than my Vista. But, I run a radio station off that PC. And until I learn linux to the point I am comfortable with it. I can't risk, messing up a damn good machine. On top of that, the software I run to do my internet radio station with, I'm not sure it works with linux yet. I mean if I was to build a bare bones system, I'd still be in the same boat. CD boots to Parted Magic, partitions the HD, and bang.. Stuck in the same spot. Thats where I'm at... I can Us Parted Magic to Partition the HD. But after that... I'm stuck. Something RIGHT there is the problem! Shouldn't matter what the system is, just how do you prep the system to load Linux onto the HD. So, CDR to Bootable HD. The software will then tell you wheather or not it will run on the machine (I Hope).And yes I have DSL, Puppy all of them... I mean after I get to the point I can work from the basic install, and configure it, I'll know then if it was worth the time to mess with Linux..

Does your time have value? If so, then I highly recommend doing your first test-drive of Linux on capable, modern hardware. If you are worried about messing up your Windows computer that runs your radio station (an understandable caution) then you can use a technology called "virtualization" to test it safely. Here are easy instructions for test-driving Ubuntu in Windows using VirtualBox:

http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/virtualbox

You can also safely test drive Ubuntu, or any Linux, as a Live CD or Live USB (so long as you don't choose the Install option or any disk utilities).

Your old hardware is not capable of running modern Linux, as you have discovered... you are wasting your valuable time in my opinion, and I fear your eventual conclusion that "Linux is not worth it" will be tainted by your choice of hardware.

So I'm still not clear where you are getting stuck. Are you able to boot the CD into a live Linux system?

DSL, Puppy tinycore, SliTaz are mostly designed to run live off the CD. Installation to HD is not obvious, straight-forward, or necessarily stable. The resulting system will not be a typical install.

OTOH, a text-based install of Debian or Slackware should go more smoothly, though you may do best with an earlier edition such as Slackware 9.1.

Someone here may be able to help, but you haven't given enough information.

FreeNAS requires at least 4 GB of RAM to do a good set up. I have seem Budhi Linux running in a Pentium III with like 125 MB of RAM anything less than that I don't know. Bodhi linux is Ubuntu/enlightenment base and all the applications are light weight. Anyway remember to create a good swap partition (twice the size of your RAM) if you get by with the installation

http://www.bodhilinux.com/system.php


Just for fun you can also check in your hometown with your Local Linux User Group and email them and ask when is their next meeting,tell them that you have some computers that you would like to set up with linux. Usually these people are always eager to help.

Good Luck to you.

Did you look at the PartedMagic site: http://partedmagic.com/doku.php

Parted Magic requires at least a i586 processor and 312MB of RAM to operate or 175MB in “Live” mode.

Definitely select the link (lower left hand side) Using GParted and read what is there.


Am NON-technical yet managed install OK several linux versions, including Puppy with some older computers, by following their instructions.


Couple times NOT worked as expected, usually self failed to read/recall sections about problems upon Microsoft systems, or as relate to older computers. and how to avoid them.



.

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like you need to slow right down and go back to researching what it is you need to be doing to get Linux installed on your machines. I'd recommend the Mepis user manual as a pointer. http://www.mepiscommunity.org/user_manual11/index.html The first four or five chapters should give you the info you need which could be applied as a general principle to any distro. Once you've read through that, maybe go ahead and install the latest antiX version on the better spec'd spare machine and go from there.