[ale] Lightweight Linux with X

[Fulton Green]

I had a similar experience over the weekend. I'm trying to set up a 90 MHz
Pentium MMX-based notebook (24 MB RAM, 800 MB HDD, 800x600x8-bit color LCD)
as a jukebox for a friend of mine. He wanted Win98 on it, but after several
failed attempts to get the built-in trackpad to work properly, I decided to
go with a Linux-based solution.

Red Hat didn't give me grief about memory size, but it had unusually high
disk requirements (min. 256 MB swap space, 1.2 GB for a GNOME workstation),
so I took the Debian plunge (using 2.2 Potato). I had the 3 CD-ROM discs I
bought at the last Linux Showcase, so I only needed a rescue diskette and an
initial image diskette. Installation went relatively smooth (save for XFree
configuration, which isn't Debian's fault). I even had over 200 MB left over
for MP3s and such.

One problem, though, and any Debianistas out there feel free to help ... I
can't seem to figure out the Debian way for configuring a kernel module. I
wound up not selecting the SoundBlaster module during the initial install,
and now I realise I need it. But I don't see where dselect can config it,
and I don't see anything equivalent to the Red Hat sndconfig utility.

Any suggestions, besides RTFM? ;)

Thanks!

On Mon, Jul 30, 2001 at 11:23:30AM -0400, Jeff Hubbs wrote:
> I need to set up a junker for a new home school.  I have 486es on hand, with
> 12-32MB and one or two 340MB-800MB drives available.
> 
> I'm pissed at Red Hat because they're pulling this "Sorry, your computer
> doesn't have enough RAM to run Red Hat Linux" crap a la Microsoft even at
> 20MB.  It looks like Debian is not complaining.  However, I don't have much
> Debian experience and I'd like to know, in advance of trying to do it if at
> all possible, how to install Debian from floppies via an Internet distro
> mirror such that I can get X going and a low-footprint WM (open to
> suggestions).  I have done Debian this way before and I did get a running
> machine, but without X.  At that time, I also found myself a bit flummoxed
> w.r.t. getting exactly the packages I needed and little or nothing else.
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