i have a couple of p2 266mhz 64mb ram that I would like to throw linux on. Which distro would you guys recommend for machines this old? TIA
linux for an old system
- Thread starter quique55
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silverpig
Lifer
- Jul 29, 2001
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The same distros you would run on a powerhouse system. You just configure them differently.
Of course a very hands on distro where you really get to customize the install is probably best. Debian or maybe a Gentoo GRP install (so you're not waiting for hours upon hours for your system to compile) would probably be best as you can really get in there and pick everything you need.
Of course a very hands on distro where you really get to customize the install is probably best. Debian or maybe a Gentoo GRP install (so you're not waiting for hours upon hours for your system to compile) would probably be best as you can really get in there and pick everything you need.
yeah i used gentoo before on a p3 1.0ghz and I thought it took forever to compile. Dont even want to try that on these systems. Will give the GRP install a try.
Slackware or Arch Linux.
Slackware is small and slick and easily upgradable and maintainable, Arch is for people who know a bit more, the package management is extremely well done, there is a build system for what you can't find on the Package managers mirror sites (if you have ever used ports on a xBSD machine you will feel right at home) it's VERY stable (even testing and staging is VERY stable and compared to Deb or the various BSD's it is a lot better).
So, Slack or Arch is my recommendation.
Slackware is small and slick and easily upgradable and maintainable, Arch is for people who know a bit more, the package management is extremely well done, there is a build system for what you can't find on the Package managers mirror sites (if you have ever used ports on a xBSD machine you will feel right at home) it's VERY stable (even testing and staging is VERY stable and compared to Deb or the various BSD's it is a lot better).
So, Slack or Arch is my recommendation.
Well, he is right, isn't he, compiling a complete system on old hardware is not something i would recommend to ANYONE who does not have very unusual requirements.
However, Debian is either old or flaky, the stable tree is OLD and if you want anything newer and upgrades for it you are screwed if stability means anything to you.
A better alternative for those who feel the need to use Deb is Ubuntu, it's kinda like slackware current, current packs but well tested and stable.
Nothinman
Elite Member
- Sep 14, 2001
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Give it up, everyone knows that stable is old, hell that's part of the point although they're pushing it a little too far with the sarge release delays. But sid is not flaky, I use it every day on 2 machines of my own and most DDs use it for their own workstations too. Debian sid is just as reliable as any other distro's current release, more so in some cases.
Hardly, Ubuntu is essentially Debian sarge with Gnome 2.8 and now that Gnome 2.8 has made it into sarge it's got very little advantage over Debian. The "tested and stable" portion that you mention comes from Debian since most of the packages are still official Debian packages.
For a man who has no idea what he is talking about this might seem like something self evident but if you value stability you will still be the packages provided that have been stable in tests, why do you think Ubuntu has become so popular so fast?
It's because it has what Debian lacks, Debian is a great distro but Ubuntu took the best parts of Debian and tested it against a selection of different hardware, some packages were skipped, some are older because the newer are not stable, some are not included at all.
All done for two reasons, one, giving the user something easy enough to install and work with and two, providing stability that you have to spend your days doing nothing more than reading changelogs to accomplish with Debian.
You are a Deb freak and i am a slackhead, we won't ever get along when it comes to distros but still...
Merry christmas to you and those close to you
Debian and Slackware are my favorite Linux distributions. I'd probably throw OpenBSD on the boxes though. :evil:
I like Open and i like Slack but which version of Debian is your favourite, the one that is five years old or the one that somewhat works if you can get it to install?
I am not kidding either, using later versions of the Deb Installer is completely randomly successful
and i hate sysVinit scripts and HW detection that HAS support or my wifi, USB card reader and slap on dvd-recorder but is so flaky that it is completely unusable
Anyway, merry chrismas n0c, i am sure you will have a great time.
Originally posted by: Klixxer
I like Open and i like Slack but which version of Debian is your favourite, the one that is five years old or the one that somewhat works if you can get it to install?
I am not kidding either, using later versions of the Deb Installer is completely randomly successful
and i hate sysVinit scripts and HW detection that HAS support or my wifi, USB card reader and slap on dvd-recorder but is so flaky that it is completely unusable
Anyway, merry chrismas n0c, i am sure you will have a great time.
I used the middle Debian version.
I think it's called "Stupid name instead of a number or designation that makes sense." Or testing, one of the two.Happy holidays, and plenty of ho ho hos.
Nothinman
Elite Member
- Sep 14, 2001
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Because it's a sarge release with some added focus on the desktop with newer, at the time, Gnome.
Ubuntu is tested against less hardware than Debian is, they only support 3 out of the 12 arches that Debian supports. Which is also part of the reason why it was so easy for them to release as quickly as they did.
You can get both of those with sarge now.
It's called sarge and testing, it will be 3.1 when it's released.
silverpig
Lifer
- Jul 29, 2001
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psst: You can have a full gentoo install without compiling a single thing. Portage is great, and the gentoo forums have been the best linux resource I've come across. USE variables are also a big gentoo plus. And of course if you want to configure, tweak, and compile yourself, then you can.
Take mplayer for example:
"The recommended way to install MPlayer is to compile from source. For a complete installation you will need sources, a set of codecs, a set of fonts for the onscreen display (OSD) and a skin if you want a graphical user interface. Quick compilation and installation instructions are contained in the README, the installation section of the documentation has more complete information."
So you have to download and compile the sources, install your codes, your fonts, and a skin all separately. Instructions are in the README.
With gentoo it's
USE="gnome"
emerge mplayer
and that will get you mplayer, the codecs, the fonts, and the GUI with gnome support all rocketing in at 600+ kB/s (for me anyways). It's simple and it works. Of course you can get the precompiled binaries for your arch type as well if you really don't want to compile anything.
I use gentoo for the USE variables and portage. The forums are a big plus, the kernel devs browsing said forums listening to issues are another plus, and it works great for me. Don't take this as me saying gentoo is the best, or that other distros are crap (cause they're not... I use debian at school and have run slack, mandrake, redhat/fedora, and suse at times at home), but gentoo is not a waste of time on any system, and you don't have to compile everything from source.
Nothinman
Elite Member
- Sep 14, 2001
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But then you lose all the advantages that the Gentoo people scream about, i.e. USE flags.
Portage is slow and there's no real package QA AFAIK.
With Debian it's 'apt-get install mplayer-586'. If you want the windows codecs you also install w32codecs too. Whoopy do, the package system isn't what makes Debian great, although they were the leader for a long time having developed apt before anyone else thought of it. What makes Debian great is the quality of the packages, the commitment to only package DFSG free software, the idea that Debian is more than just a Linux distribution (i.e. the Debian GNU/KFreeBSD and Debian GNU/Hurd projects), the Debian social contract, etc.
silverpig
Lifer
- Jul 29, 2001
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USE flags have nothing to do with compilation.
CFLAGS="march=i686-pc-linux-gnu, -fomit-frame-pointer, -pipe, -03"
are used for compilation. From the benchmarks I've seen doing a full compile yourself makes a few percent difference but it's nothing big. This isn't much of a big deal to most people who know gentoo.
USE="gnome, gtk, -kde, -qt"
are just used in package selection. The USE flags just tell portage what you want your system to be able to do so it knows what all the dependencies are in order to get a system working the way you want. It's great for cutting the fat off of a distro because that example there will install gnome and gtk and support for both in all your apps and not install kde/qt. This makes a large difference in compile time (even though I let it run overnight...), but also in disk space as well. So even if you do a GRP precompiled install, you can set your USE flags and you'll install gnome/gtk support for everything and not kde/qt if you so desire.
CFLAGS="march=i686-pc-linux-gnu, -fomit-frame-pointer, -pipe, -03"
are used for compilation. From the benchmarks I've seen doing a full compile yourself makes a few percent difference but it's nothing big. This isn't much of a big deal to most people who know gentoo.
USE="gnome, gtk, -kde, -qt"
are just used in package selection. The USE flags just tell portage what you want your system to be able to do so it knows what all the dependencies are in order to get a system working the way you want. It's great for cutting the fat off of a distro because that example there will install gnome and gtk and support for both in all your apps and not install kde/qt. This makes a large difference in compile time (even though I let it run overnight...), but also in disk space as well. So even if you do a GRP precompiled install, you can set your USE flags and you'll install gnome/gtk support for everything and not kde/qt if you so desire.
silverpig
Lifer
- Jul 29, 2001
- 27,703
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True, but the ebuilds don't just compile your software.
USE="truetype"
emerge openoffice-bin
will install a precompiled openoffice and the truetype fonts for it. This is just an example, and truetype may be more of a system font thing than an openoffice specific thing, but you can definitely use USE variables on precompiled software because they don't really affect the compilation. They're used to bundle codecs with players and such. Actually, a better example would be setting gnome and gtk as use variables and then doing a GRP install of mplayer. Portage will read that you want gtk support for mplayer and will install the gmplayer frontend, but nothing will be compiled on your system.
CFLAGS are the true compiler options. Including -fomit-frame-pointer will produce a different binary than not including it, so this is where you would lose the benefit of not compiling yourself.
It looks like -fomit-frame-pointer is included with -O, -O2, -O3, and -Os. -O3 only tunrs on the -finline-functions, -funit-at-a-time and -frename-registers options. Everytime I see inline functions mentioned in regards to gcc, well, they aren't good comments.
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