I have been using SuSE since 7.1 usually Professional editions. Now using SuSE10 OSS. A continuing concern was poor performance. Having recently used Fedora Core 5 and Debian Sarge it has become glaringly obvious that SuSE has a problem here.

On booting 'free' says these distros use about 192mb RAM but SuSE uses much more. Removing Gimp from preload helps, but compiling kernel lead to 'iptables need to be updated' error and resulting failure to connect to the internet.

Now also KDM problem - can't login as user - keep getting returned to login screen. I know there is a CLI fix for this but have forgotten the file concerned ? /usr/bin/kdm?

I need to run SuSE10 OSS on Pentium 1.0G machine with 256mb RAM, for a network I am setting up for a charity. My laptop with 1.0G RAM even starts accessing the swap file resulting in poor performance.

Summary:
1. Memory woes
2. iptables update problem
3. KDM - unable to login

Any help with any of these would be really appreciated, but especially the speed problem.

Cheers

I suggest you just buy more memory. Trying to run a Fedora Core 5 on 256MB will result in slowness, I've tried; if you buy another 256MB of RAM, you'll get a better performance. And that much memory isn't so expensive, so just go and buy it, or switch to a lighter desktop (XFCE, for example). KDE/Gnome themselves are memory hogs, even if the rest of the system wasn't.

I have already done this, they came with only 128mb RAM and have only two memory slots. They are Dell 150GX desktops. Also they won't take any RAM, they are not DDR RAM and Dell's is supposed to be only compatible with Kingston RAM but strangely enough often isn't, but some other sort is; case of trial and error unfortunately.

The problem is they work WELL with KDE and Fedora Core 5 or KDE and Debian Sarge, just like dogs on SuSE 10. On boot SuSE10 just eats RAM - even my laptop with 1G RAM starts to use swap file! Removing GIMP from preload helped, programmer friend said it is a software problem, which fits in with what I have experienced, hence request for help re hacking software and compiling kernel. Also have matching monitors which are excellent, hence attempts to resolve software problems. Very seriously thinking when all things are considered of switching to Fedora Core 5 which I am getting more and more impressed about.

Fixed the KDM loop login problem by cd /users-home-dir/ and

moving .xinitrc to .xinitrc.old

Cheers