486SX runs "newish" Linux?

[Lisa Winkler]

I have had this problem on a couple of different systems.  On one (this
was an old P-100 w/ a 2GB drive running redhat 6.?), the problem was
solved by adding "linear" to the list of options in lilo.conf.  On
another (a fairly new 750MHz Athlon with a 10GB drive, running RH 7.2)
the problem was fixed by removing the linear option from lilo.conf, and
also installing lilo in the master boot record rather than the first
sector of the boot partition.  The suggestion of creating a /boot would
likely help also.

Lisa


On Mon, 2001-11-19 at 00:07, Rusty Carruth wrote:
> > 
> > On Sunday 18 November 2001 08:27 pm, Alan Dayley wrote:
> > > I have an old 486SX PC that I thought would be good as a basic Linux
> > > install to allow my kids to surf with.  It's specs are below.
> > >
> > > RH 7.2 install just gets a little ways in and gives up because there is no
> > > math co-processor.  Slackware 8.0 when clear through the entire
> > > installation and fails on the first actual boot, printing "LI" of the lilo
> > > boot message and freezing completely.
> 
> "LI" means that the disk geometry changed.  (Or something like that -
> look it up in the lilo howto - I know that 'li' means something
> important like that.  Did you get a warning about more thatn
> 1024 cyls when running lilo?  If so, then that would explain it -
> the image may be up higher than 1024...
> 
> > > Will any of the "standard" distributions work on this PC or should I go
> > > looking for some distro specialized for low powered systems?  Or, perhaps
> > > the lilo problem has nothing to do with low power?
> 
> > The "LI" problem should have nothing to do with low power. I got the same 
> 
> Like I say, it has nothing to do with underpowered.  Its a LILO
> error message (for strange values of 'error message' ;-)
> 
> > to the other location (as opposed to where ever I chose before and got "LI").
> 
> The other thing is that if you made a /boot partition near the start,
> you can avoid at least one lilo problem folks often have.
> 
> > > SPECS:
> > > "Dell Precision 486/33S", 33 MHz 486SX, 16MB RAM, 1.2GB IDE hard drive
> 
> Newer versions of Mandrake will NOT install with less than 32 meg of
> ram.  However, my firewall box (the one I'm currently typing on ;-)
> has version 7.0.2 of mandrake and works just fine.  I *think* it
> also has 16 meg of ram (and I know I've used a 16meg firewall
> before).
> 
> I assume similar problems exist for other distros.
> 
> There are some special 486-based firewall distros out there,
> or use an older <choose a distro> and upgrade all the security
> things...
> 
> (Me, I finally punted and bought a cheap ($20) pentium system
> to use as my firewall - one of these days it will be up
> and running mandrake 8.1!  Real Soon Now ;-)
> 
> rc
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