What is the smallest Amount of Ram you've seen Described

[sports fan Matt]

Whats the smallest amount of Ram you have seen that has gotten a linux machine running with breaking it? lower then 64 and do you have stories about setting it up? Im gonna try and see if my brother's laptop can handle it..I believe its 196 or 192 mb..but ill show him the disk first

Edit: Feel free to move the post if its already been discussed..

[-grubby]

I ran DSL on a laptop with 32 MB of RAM before and it was fine

[yabbadabbadont]

16 mb on my 486 at one time. (Using Slackware '96) X windows and everything. Recommended setup, 4-8 mb of memory and 12mb of disk space... :D

[p_quarles]

There are a couple specialized distros (Puppy Linux and Damn Small Linux) that are built to run on as little as 32 MB of RAM.

With 196 MB, though, your brother should be fine with Xubuntu or Fluxbuntu.

[FuturePilot]

192 MB with a ~900MHz Pentium III with Xubuntu. It's quite fast too.:)

[-grubby]

There are a couple specialized distros (Puppy Linux and Damn Small Linux) that are built to run on as little as 32 MB of RAM.

With 196 MB, though, your brother should be fine with Xubuntu or Fluxbuntu.

I think puppy's limit is 64 MB and DSL's for sure is 16MB

[p_quarles]

I think puppis limit is 64 MB and DSL's for sure is 16MB
Yeah, you're right. I just couldn't remember which was which, so I thought I round off. :)

[sports fan Matt]

I meant to say without..heh...He's always complaining about viruses and spyware..etc..I took a shot in the dark about the amount of memory. Im pretty sure he cant use my disj cause his lappy isnt powerful enough..When I return from Thanksgiving down south i'll let you guys know. Im gonna let him make the decision and not force it though...

[LaRoza]

I installed Zenwalk on a computer with 64 MB of RAM, and it worked.

The smallest amount of RAM I have seen was quite small. The hard drive was 20 MB, so you can guess about the RAM (I don't know exactly what it was)

[Compucore]

4 megs of ram on a 80386 slackware 3.4 and about 40 megs which includes xwindows gnome interface on it.

[init1]

4 megs of ram on a 80386 slackware 3.4 and about 40 megs which includes xwindows gnome interface on it.
What? I don't think it's possible to even run X with 4MB! Was this a very old Linux that may have had a smaller X?

[yabbadabbadont]

What? I don't think it's possible to even run X with 4MB! Was this a very old Linux that may have had a smaller X?

As he posted, Slackware 3.4. ;)

[Bungo Pony]

DSL needs a minimum of 16M, but I'm running it on a 40M machine.

[DjBones]

my pops has a pretty ancient computer that has 2 megs of ram..
and the hard-drive was like 20 megs i think.
originally it ran Win 3.11 lol, although at one point i'm sure it was the bleeding edge ;)

[synd7]

Theoretically you could have no ram and use swap instead couldn't you? Albeit MUCH slower than ram

[jinx099]

Theoretically you could have no ram and use swap instead couldn't you? Albeit MUCH slower than ram

The computer needs RAM to even boot, so no that is not possible.

[stinger30au]

64 kilobytes of ram on a TRS-80 Colour Computer 1 in the early 80's...

actually it was called OS9 Level 1 version 2 by Microware. It is based on Unix...

[happy-and-lost]

DSL was smokin' fast on my P1 100MHz with 24mb RAM

[inversekinetix]

1 KB, 901 bytes available (upgradable to 64 KB)

on my zx80.

[-grubby]

1 KB, 901 bytes available (upgradable to 64 KB)

on my zx80.

jeez!

[sports fan Matt]

1 kb???? jeez..the computer even STARTS?????:lolflag:

[tdrusk]

DSL can run with 8mb of ram

Minimum Requirements for DSL with X-Window:

* i386
* 8 MB RAM
FAQ section

[-grubby]

DSL can run with 8mb of ram

FAQ section

I could've sworn it was a 486 with 16megs of ram

from the DSL site


Run light enough to power a 486DX with 16MB of Ram

[ryanVickers]

My wristwatch has NO ram! :p

jk, ok, I saw on this one site the requirements for a router or something... along the lines of primitive internet (browsers, services, modems...), and it needed 4Mb of parody ram or better :lolflag:

[Fbot1]

The computer needs RAM to even boot, so no that is not possible.

Well I suppose it's possible if you're using a computer straight out of a Dr. Suess book. But seriously, they're possible and have even been built but, none of the ones that have been built could even hold linux 0.01 (at least as far as I know).

[Havoc]

I use Linux (2.6.17 and 2.6.23) on a 32MB machine (which also comes with 16MB) every day... It's an HPC, and the distro is pretty much created by us, but still, RAM usage with IceWM running is at about 7MB. :) With just the console, it's at about 3-4MB.

Actually, things are pretty fast on the machine, considering it's about 10 years old technology (running on a 133MHz SH3 CPU). Linux is fine for older machines, if the .config is tweaked well.

;)

Hehe screenie:

http://devfiles.jlime.com/temporary/desktop.png

[popch]

I use Linux (2.6.17 and 2.6.23) on a 32MB machine (which also comes with 16MB) every day... It's an HPC, and the distro is pretty much created by us, but still, RAM usage with IceWM running is at about 7MB. :) With just the console, it's at about 3-4MB.

Actually, things are pretty fast on the machine, considering it's about 10 years old technology (running on a 133MHz SH3 CPU). Linux is fine for older machines, if the .config is tweaked well.



Would that distro run on a pda as well? I use a PocketLoox by Fujitsu-Siemens. I have no idea what processor it uses, but it does 'pocket windows'.

[RebounD11]

Our school's library has some ancient computers... 8 MB RAM for each... I couldn't figure out what distro they run (I really wasn't that curious at the moment), all I know is that it has a 2.6.9 kernel a either a very old Xfce or sth close. Anyway they do their job flawlessly :D (probably the smartest choice my school made using them like this).

[coolglobal]

Our school's library has some ancient computers... 8 MB RAM for each... I couldn't figure out what distro they run (I really wasn't that curious at the moment), all I know is that it has a 2.6.9 kernel a either a very old Xfce or sth close. Anyway they do their job flawlessly :D (probably the smartest choice my school made using them like this).

Beautiful.

[K.Mandla]

I've seen pictures of a 486 with 16Mb surfing the Internet with DSL.

Personally, I've gotten Ubuntu working on machines with 36Mb.

[Havoc]

Would that distro run on a pda as well? I use a PocketLoox by Fujitsu-Siemens. I have no idea what processor it uses, but it does 'pocket windows'.

Nah, these things are not like PCs. You'd need a kernel specifically suited for the machine, a user-space distribution (meaning, a root image) and a bootloader. Not simple stuff, though you could check if the Familiar Distribution ( http://www.handhelds.org/moin/moin.cgi/FrontPage ) supports your machine. :)

[tdrusk]

I could've sworn it was a 486 with 16megs of ram

from the DSL site
hmm

My info was in the FAQ off the site. Yours was for 486. Mine was for 386. How big of a difference would that make?