XFCE Ubuntu 6.06.1 on 120Mhz Pentium 1 + 48Mb + 1.5Gb

[K.Mandla]

Just to show it can be done, this is Turbo, a no-name 120Mhz Pentium 1 desktop with 48Mb memory and a 1.5Gb hard drive. Turbo is sporting a fresh-brewed copy of Ubuntu 6.06.1, with an exceedingly sparse XFCE desktop installed.

Video is courtesy of an ATI Mach64 PCI video card. I pulled the sound card, the SCSI adapter and the modem (all ISA cards) just to keep things as clean and simple as possible. The NIC is an ancient Intel Ethernet PRO 100 pulled from the carcass of a Compaq desktop.

Installation took about six hours, with four of that going to hardware troubleshooting (it's a new-to-me machine). Only two or so went to the necessary tweaks and adjustments to keep Turbo in a manageable state. Turbo is running the stock Ubuntu 2.6.15-26-386 kernel (the 686 drove him batty -- but I had to try it) and a 16-bit desktop at 1024x768.

The only real problem is that Turbo's only mouse connection is via serial port. And I don't have a proper serial mouse (my adapters don't seem to work), so I'm mouseless. Which makes things a little difficult to use. ...

Why?

Why not?!

[jason.b.c]

In the first picture , Why do you have a hard drive sticking out of the front of the black one...??

What's the disk in the xubuntu machine..?? Grub floppy..??

[K.Mandla]

The black one is a dual Xeon that I put an extra DVDRW in. It came from a machine that had a molded case tray and I had to take it off to salvage the drive. The inner tray is white, which is what you're seeing.

The floppy is a copy of Smart Boot Manager; Turbo won't boot from CD.

[mips]

Why not use something lighter like Fluxbox or are you into S&M ?

[Lord Illidan]

I think Damn Small Linux is a better bet...and it works with serial mice, I've tried it myself.

[K.Mandla]

I think Damn Small Linux is a better bet...and it works with serial mice, I've tried it myself.

Yeah, but I had to try. DSL makes things too easy.

[K.Mandla]

No, I'm just used to the interface. Openbox or Fluxbox would be a better fit, that's for sure. But until I get my hands on a working serial mouse and can be sure there's no fault in the connection, anything other than Ratpoison is pointless.

Get it? Pointless??! Hahaha!

Sorry.

[K.Mandla]

Ratpoison to the rescue!

After a quick sudo aptitude install x-window-system-core ratpoison firefox, I can get Turbo online now. I couldn't do it before, because I couldn't reach the Applications menu without a mouse.

It's clumsy for me, but it saves me $8 for a new serial mouse.

I also managed to shave the boot time (to less than 2:30 ) by stripping out most of ubuntu-minimal and ubuntu-standard, and disabling just about every service I could find. Of course, my Firefox start time is probably the worst on the forum. ...

Whoa! What a hot rod!

[jason.b.c]

It's clumsy for me, but it saves me $8 for a new serial mouse.

What..? , It dosen't have a mouse..??

What about a serial-to-ps2 adapter..??

Does it not have the ps2 port for a regular mouse..?

[K.Mandla]

What..? , It dosen't have a mouse..?? ...

Nope, it predates PS/2 ports. There's no PS/2 mouse port and the keyboard connects through the old-fashioned five-pin DIN plug. It's about as big around as your thumb and takes an adapter to get it going. You can still find the adapters in computer stores, but they're very pricey.

I can connect a PS/2 mouse through a serial port with an adapter, but for whatever reason, the PS/2 mice I use don't work (no matter what OS I use). I've used PS/2 ball mice and even an optical USB plus USB-to-PS/2 connector plus PS/2-to-serial connector, but no dice. (Not that I expected that to work, really.)

I have to find a straight serial-only mouse to connect it, but those things are about $8 new online. I don't see them at Staples. I could check my mom-and-pop computer store, but something tells me it would be about as much, maybe more. And even then, it might be that the motherboard is faulty.

I have other options. There used to be PS/2 connector riser cards, but I think those were motherboard-dependent. I could also find a PCI USB card and connect that way, but that's probably more expensive than a serial mouse.

But this is only an experiment, and I don't plan on keeping Turbo for long. So I'm not keen on spending money on it.

This is one of the neat things about the free *nix: make old machines useful again.

Exactly! Or at least functional. ...