Baslinux mailing list

[baslinux AT lists.ibiblio.org]

> > Steven, do you plan to update BL, either to a new version,
> > or find ways to support more hardware
>
> I'm still using the same old hardware, so I have no
> interest in developing something for newer hardware
> (which I wouldn't be able to test).  Besides there
> are plenty of small distributions suitable for newer
> hardware.

What do you suggest for low-ram (16-32MB) laptops for internet use?


Slitaz booted with 50MB RAM.  No dialup modem support.  Lots of games.
Puppy needs at least 64MB to work right.  But beginner-friendly.

DSL uses 10MB RAM before running programs.  It might run Opera (it has a 
package) in 32MB RAM.  Firefox 2 would need more.

BL3 with glibc 2.2.5 runs Opera 8.54 in 24MB RAM plus swap file at usable 
speed.

> BasicLinux was designed to maximize performance of
> 486s and low-end Pentiums.  There are still some of
> those machines around and I am content to leave
> BasicLinux for them.

BL2 esp. with the SW11 library upgrades works fine on desktops of all 
speeds.  (Except that I cannot compile or even run some X programs.  If I 
added enough SW11 libraries such as the later Xorg, probably more things 
would run).  I just set up a 300MHz for someone.  Is anyone still 
installing BL to a lower-end pentium desktop?  People keep giving us 
working 1GHz or faster desktop machines, free.

 >> Does BL work with built-in laptop wireless?
> I don't know.  None of my five laptops has
> built-in wireless.

What do you have?  I recall a Toshiba Satellite.  We have Satellite 100MHz 
(24MB), 133MHz (16MB, USB), 250 (Pro with 320MB RAM - useless with Puppy) 
and 266 (32MB) (both of these have USB and cardbus).  Dell 166 (48MB - a 
133 is coming).  Hitachi 133 (32MB, USB).

These were given to us with dead hard drives or more recently just because 
they were too old to run Windows.  They all run 2-floppy BL3, but the 
Hitachi and I think the DELL have neomagic video that does not work with 
Xvesa (SVGA X or Xfbdev work with no-xvesa.tgz).

Compaq Armada 133 (cardbus) and 233 (cardbus and USB), both 32MB RAM, 
don't work with Steven's 2-floppy BL3 due to MCE and kernel 2.2.26.

All but one of the above should work fine with BL and Opera.  Not with 
Puppy, marginally with DSL in 32MB (maybe with Opera - I should test).
More RAM for these would cost more than the laptops (they were free).


The following will run other distributions.  USB and cardbus.

Compaq Presario 233 USB/cardbus (96MB RAM - I jammed Win2K on here for 
someone who insisted on using AOL which needs IE - it ran at a crawl).

Gateway 200Mhz (which I upped to 112MB RAM).  Neomagic video.  Probably 
enough RAM to work slowly with Puppy and Xorg.  Works nicely with BL2.

Two 300MHz Compaq (came with broken screen and/or cracked solder joints) 
and one Winbook (all USB and cardbus).  128MB upped to 192MB.  Puppy 
worked fine on the Compaq Presario.  But no framebuffer support unless you 
compile your own kernel for it.  Console mode (expanded text to fill the 
screen) looks awful.  BL2 works better (with 16-bit wireless card).

The people who gave these to us consider them low-end because they won't 
run XP.  They are 10 or more years old.   I have been given six working 
cardbus wireless cards already, four B and two G (considered low-end).
The B cards do WEP but not WPA.

The Puppy CD-burner program took half an hour to START burning (at 300Mhz 
- I think their programs were not tested at this speed, as most of them 
max out the cpu on startup and take a few seconds to load).  I was burning 
CDs with cdrecord in BL in the time it took me to type cdr-on, readcd and 
cdrecord.

I cannot find even an SSH package for DSL (they have a server not a 
client).  The telnet package in DSL and both telnet and SSH in Puppy do 
not work right at my bbs (nor does Windows telnet, of course).

I can read the bbs using the first floppy of BL3.  BL uses standard SW 
packages. It has an understandable structure without 10 levels of rc and 
everything automated.  It is elegant.  It works perfectly (on most of my
hardware). It is easy to make changes and additions to.  Except for this 
dratted cardbus support, BL is my distro of choice.

I have suggested it for someone with a 133Mhz laptop without USB.  (I may 
need to return the 16-bit wireless card he gave me).  He wants to run it 
from a 4GB pcmcia flash drive to conserve the battery.  I think you can 
boot from floppy, load pcmcia modules using default config, and chroot to 
hde1 (?). Format a partition on the flash drive like I did my camera 
memory.  (Maybe DSL or puppy boot disks can boot to the drive?).

I wonder if there is some way to chroot to DSL from BL, get connected (in 
terminal mode) and use the connection in BL.  I can dial with BL2 and 
chroot to BL3.  DSL uses 2.4.33 kernel and I compiled 2.4.31, but I can 
try forcing modules with insmod -f.  Does this sound possible?

> > Will there be any USB wireless support?
>
> None of my laptops has USB.

Gateway Essentials desktop has no normal PCI slots.  I set up someone with 
one with USB wireless.  A nearby town now has free wireless internet.

I hope someone gives you a cardbus-capable laptop soon.  Do you buy your 
laptops?

> Cheers,
> Steven