[Gllug] retro computing

[Steve Nelson]

On 10/5/05, Brad Cahoon <kedikebab at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am about to receive a 386 laptop which I would like to idealy get X
> running on, having trolled the internet not much came up. I thought the
> guru's here must be running bleading edge software on dinosaur hardware just
> for the fun of it. any comments on distros etc greatly received.

Firstly, I can see why it might be both fun and frustrating to get
something running on a very old piece of kit.  However, I think its
going to be a very tough job finding something current and secure
enough that will get going on a 386 laptop.  That's not to suggest you
shouldn't have a go.

Personally, I'd ask myself what the goal is - is it to be able to say
"yay! I have linux working on a really old dinosaur of a machine!" ? 
Or is it because you don't have any other machines available, and this
is the only machine you can use?

If its the former - go ahead all guns blazing; If its the latter I am
sure there's a very high probability that someone on this list will
have a p1 or p2 you could have for free, and that'll run whatever you
like.

Now, assuming you do want to have a crack at it, our very own Bruce
has written a how-to on getting old laptops to work:

http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/other-formats/html_single/4mb-Laptops.html.

Its a bit old now (written in 2000 I think), but all the principles
are fine still.  He uses Slackware in the example - and I'd recommend
you do the same.

The other alternative is to try something like netbsd.  I've not had
that running on a 386 before, but I have had it running on similarly
ancient non-intel kit, and its worked like a dream.

Have fun.

> Brad Cahoon

Steve
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