From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S263424AbTDIORJ (for ); Wed, 9 Apr 2003 10:17:09 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S263425AbTDIORJ (for ); Wed, 9 Apr 2003 10:17:09 -0400 Received: from gandalph.mad.hu ([193.225.158.7]:49164 "EHLO gandalph.mad.hu") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S263424AbTDIORI (for ); Wed, 9 Apr 2003 10:17:08 -0400 Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2003 16:28:49 +0200 From: Gergely Nagy To: Linux Kernel Mailing List Cc: dusty@violin.dyndns.org Subject: Re: Linux-2.4.20 on a 4 MB Laptop Message-ID: <20030409142849.GA9381@gandalph.mad.hu> Mail-Followup-To: Linux Kernel Mailing List , dusty@violin.dyndns.org References: <200304091601.55821.dusty@violin.dyndns.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <200304091601.55821.dusty@violin.dyndns.org> User-Agent: Mutt/1.3.28i Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org > What I want to know is if this happens just because of the low memory (4MB) or > if there is another reason for this behaviour. There must be another reason, I'm running a 80486/4Mb (Compaq Contura) with 2.4.20 just fine. Even networking is present. You need lots of swap, though. > What do you think: What are the minimum requirements for Linux on such a > laptop (no X, of course, very simple setup): 8MB, 12MB? The very minimum? 4Mb + lots of swap. To make it closer to usable, I'd say 8Mb. Altough, I had this setup on my Contura: Contura connects to the main box via plip, another laptop (old Thinkpad) connects to Contura via ppp, and Contura NATs it through the main box. Meanwhile, I could run mutt, reading e-mail, and zile, editing some documentation. Both from screen. And I've been logged into the machine via ssh. It was a bit slow, but worked. So 4Mb _is_ enough, even for running Debian sid.