Talk:MiniSUSE - Test SUSE Linux on Minimal Hardware

From openSUSE

I have available a number of versions of SuSE, from 8.2 through 10.1. I also am involved with a community group trying to recycle old PCs. I have a collection of old video cards, and end up getting exposed to various video systems on the motherboard.

I have NOT been able to get SuSE 10.1 to install with 128M if there is a need to use a custom partitioning of the hard drive (and most of my drives come from Windows systems with no Swap partition). The install starts out OK, but it insists on trying to figure out all of the software install issues before you are allowed to set up the hard disk. Sometime during the hard disk setup the screen update rate gets VERY slow (goes from seconds to 5-15 minutes to switch screens to set up a partition). When it takes longer than 15 minutes to update the screen, I kill the install.

SuSE also is not very friendly with older video cards or embedded chips on the motherboards. It also is VERY bad if you try to change the card after an install.

I just recently tried PCLinuxOS (0.93), on a 350Mhz Pentium II, with 128M RAM. The live CD and install worked fine, and the speed of apps is OK. This version should have a kernel and apps similiar to SuSE 10.1. One difference was that it allowed me to partition the drive, creating a SWAP partition, early in the process. That it allowed it more flexability than SuSE's approach which has to keep everything in RAM until it knows everything about the install process. Bruce butterfield 23:32, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

The swap must exist prior to instalation, otherwise installation will fail. That YaST is trying to do all from RAM is known and it is one of reasons for MiniSUSE existence. We want to see how to make comfortable partitioning and creation of swap very early in installation process, like you mentioned for PCLinux. What you can help is to test procedure in Installation_with_Little_Memory, Logging_YaST_to_USB_Stick_in_Installation and/or YaST_Remote_Logging_in_Installation and publish results on MiniSUSE_-_Test_SUSE_Linux_on_Minimal_Hardware. Apropos video cards, that is another issue that I would like to know more about as I used quite a few with little or no problems. The only thing is that older cards with little memory (1 to 2 MB) have problem with resolution. The end effect is problematic colors, as present operating systems use images that demand at list 16 bit color, which would not look good with only 1 MB RAM. Changing card after installation must be followed with Xorg reconfiguration using SaX2 or text mode YaST, and so far I know, there will be no automatic fallback to vga mode like in other OS any soon. Linux has mighty command line and no need to have some GUI in order to reconfigure Xorg server. --Rajko M 05:23, 7 December 2006 (UTC)