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[Sindi Keesan <keesan AT iamjlamb.com>]

To run X without sw/MENU type

Xvesa -screen 800x600x12 & rxvt [-g ...] [-fn ...]

The default rxvt is rather small.  
In BL2 at 1024 I chose -g 154x44 for full-size screen in default font.

BL3 uses sh - 252 bytes.  Init (3x196) = 588 bytes.
Min RAM used = 840 bytes

swm - 684 bytes
MENU - 592 bytes (after I added 2 xterms to it)

rxvt - 612 bytes
Xvesa - at 12-bit color 920 bytes, at other depths more
(16 bit 924, 8-bit 1088, 4-bit 1100).

Total RAM without swm/MENU - 840+612+920 = 2472
Total RAM with swm/MENU - 3,748

Without swm/MENU Xvesa will let you run a 528K program in 3M RAM.
With swm/MENU you can only run a 252K program in 4M RAM. 

I was able to load Opera in BL2 without any wm.  But there is no
way to switch focus without a mouse (no Alt-Tab) in the rxvt.
Rxvt size was irrelevant - Opera loads itself full-screen.

Kermit - 1952 bytes
Lynx 2.8.1 - 1280
Links -0.90 - 708

None of these need X to run but it is a way to get more columns.
Lynx and links need xli for viewing images, in BL3.
They will both run in 4M RAM without swm/MENU but not with them.