Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-09-09, 03:26:

In the process of installing Slackware 13 using the huge.s kernel which can be used with a 486. If that goes well I'll give Slackware 14 and the latest 15 a shot.

Caluser2000 wrote:

Well that went way way better than the last time I gave it a shot around four or more years ago.

There are a number of versions of Slackware 13.xx. Which one? Also how much ram is on your 486? I have Slackware 12 on a 486, I think 33MHz, with 12mb of RAM, and it wasn't all that fast. This was more than 10 years ago, but it still is on there.

the3dfxdude wrote on 2021-09-09, 14:10:

Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-09-09, 03:26:

In the process of installing Slackware 13 using the huge.s kernel which can be used with a 486. If that goes well I'll give Slackware 14 and the latest 15 a shot.

Caluser2000 wrote:

Well that went way way better than the last time I gave it a shot around four or more years ago.

There are a number of versions of Slackware 13.xx. Which one? Also how much ram is on your 486? I have Slackware 12 on a 486, I think 33MHz, with 12mb of RAM, and it wasn't all that fast. This was more than 10 years ago, but it still is on there.

The original 13.0 that came on a computer mag DVD in 2002.

Version 14.2 went well also. really no difference between the installation procedures at all. Again using the huge.s kernal. I got the ISO from this site https://soft.lafibre.info/ It has the Linux 4.x kernel as oppose to the 3.2of the original SW 14.0 which is aso available on that site. I't's th newst kernel I've use on this AMD K6-2 4000 rig. Ran xfce4 also but it was quite laggy compared to SW 12.o. The was the compositer. I turned that of and xfce4 was waaay better and a lot more responsive.You can change the various DE/WMs by typing xwmconfig at the cli. I've switched mine to ann of buddy Window Maker. It's the wm I use on my vary first Linux installation on a HP slimeline P200mmx system back in the early 2000s....😉

There is no 32-bit Slackware 15 out yet. But if anyone wants to try the SL 15 beta you can get ie at this site https://linuxiac.com/slackware-linux-15-0-bet … legend-is-back/

My AMD K6-2 400 Linux rig has a whopping 252megs of ram in it and Matrox video card with 4megs ov vram, usb mouse via usb 2.0 pci card and AT keyboard. It's a missmatch of parts from various eras but they all work...😉 Networking functioned out of the box so to speak and accessing the in ternet was childs play using the supplied Firefox.

I disabled compositer on this P4 3.2GHz system as well an a big difference in GUI speed like Slackware 14.2.

Another 32-bit Linux that runs on i586 hardware. This time it is mageia. It is a fork of Mandrivia Linux which was a rename Mandrale Linux. Here is the site if anyone is interested https://www.mageia.org/en/about/ I'm testing out the xfce live 32-bit version at the moment and it is looking promising 😉 But we'll see whether it comes up with a desktop.

So far we have quite a good selection of computer operating systems that will run on i586 systems. Some ancient up to some that are quite new and being maintained.

Have we covered all the weird crap between 80 and 90, CP/M-86, MP/M-86, Minix, Microsoft Unix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenix, the dozen other unixalikes, Visi On (ran on top of DOS, but ppl keep calling windows an OS soooooo...) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visi_On

edit: Late 586 may work with AROS, it might be a fiddlefest though https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Aros/Platforms/ … lete_System_HCL
edit2: PS I don't think the non-native i.e. 68k code emulation via UAE is particularly faster than other x86 running UAE, so you might find interoperability with original Amiga software limited on less than ~500Mhz.. Stuff that could be recompiled to x86 will probably fly on anything 100Mhz up though.

I installed xenix at one time but found useless in respect that it only supported scsi hdd iirc and the network card selection paled compared to my 286 running Dos and Win3.1 Bugger all software to run on it as well.

This will give everybody a bit of a laugh 😉 http://www.softpanorama.org/People/Torvalds/F … with_unix.shtml I think guy guy who published it had a crush in Linus 🤣. A talk about repetition Trev. That page should be 1/3rd the size. Note the MickyS0ft-SCO connection.

Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-02-23, 01:24:

In the Slackware installation you use to be able to switch to a 486 kernal. That may be someting worth trying. I found it less seamless than the above three.

I follow slackware regularly. It supported i486 officially until 14.1. In 14.2 the dev dropped it because he found certain packages could not properly run anymore. Officially it is now i586. But it was recently discovered in beta testing 15.0, that qt toolkit does not run correctly on a pentium 3. This suggests that unofficially, pentium 4 is the minimum. Which version of pentium 4 is a good question, because I don't know which opcodes that are required. As we know many pieces of software lately are making it hard to run on anything without sse3/sse4. So I think while modern linux continues to remain a good choice for many aged systems, I think there is a ticking time bomb of "oops, sorry we broke x", which includes i586. I think pretty much anything older than ~2007 is at risk since 2017.

That said, I think that it's possible to still shrink down the distro and recompile these packages for as old as i486, and still have a usable modern system, given you have enough ram to run the programs. So really very late 486 systems are the minimum.

I've got a sour taste in my mouth since Ubuntu 18.04 LTS kicked 32 bit out of support 2 years early. Linux seems to be moving a lot closer to bleeding edge hardware wise, with poor legacy support. Seems like you can't rely on anything working the same with each release now. Asking questions on linux forums you frequently get referred to 5+ year old info that's been out of date for 4 years. I don't want to have to "live" in a linux forum to get blow by blow accounts of the incremental changes that make my crap not work. "We only broke one thing" yeah, but when every system has 50+ "things" that need to hang together for the whole mess to work right, you're breaking a lot of systems every time. I can still get security updates for Windows 10 on Atom based systems that have been booted out of mainstream linux support, it's the world turned upside down when MS is doing a longer support window than top linux distros. I think windows 10 even beats them on minimum RAM requirement these days, (And I have used it on minimum, it does better on 1GB than windows 7 does, it's as usable as 7 or Vista with 2GB, more like fully patched and SPed XP with 1GB) Anyway, not meaning to come across like an MS troll, just really disappointed by the direction linux seems to be taking in the last few years.

What did they kick out and what do you miss more? Only the kernel or the entire 32bit user land?

the3dfxdude wrote on 2021-09-10, 14:34:

I follow slackware regularly. It supported i486 officially until 14.1. In 14.2 the dev dropped it because he found certain packa […]
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Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-02-23, 01:24:

In the Slackware installation you use to be able to switch to a 486 kernal. That may be someting worth trying. I found it less seamless than the above three.

I follow slackware regularly. It supported i486 officially until 14.1. In 14.2 the dev dropped it because he found certain packages could not properly run anymore. Officially it is now i586. But it was recently discovered in beta testing 15.0, that qt toolkit does not run correctly on a pentium 3. This suggests that unofficially, pentium 4 is the minimum. Which version of pentium 4 is a good question, because I don't know which opcodes that are required. As we know many pieces of software lately are making it hard to run on anything without sse3/sse4. So I think while modern linux continues to remain a good choice for many aged systems, I think there is a ticking time bomb of "oops, sorry we broke x", which includes i586. I think pretty much anything older than ~2007 is at risk since 2017.

That said, I think that it's possible to still shrink down the distro and recompile these packages for as old as i486, and still have a usable modern system, given you have enough ram to run the programs. So really very late 486 systems are the minimum.

I knew about the 32-bit issue in Slackware 15 but being the cantankerous type I like to fine out for my self....😉

The Slackware version 14,2 still states i496 class sytems are supported by the huge.s kernel.

BitWrangler wrote on 2021-09-10, 15:29:

I've got a sour taste in my mouth since Ubuntu 18.04 LTS kicked 32 bit out of support 2 years early. Linux seems to be moving a lot closer to bleeding edge hardware wise, with poor legacy support. Seems like you can't rely on anything working the same with each release now. Asking questions on linux forums you frequently get referred to 5+ year old info that's been out of date for 4 years. I don't want to have to "live" in a linux forum to get blow by blow accounts of the incremental changes that make my crap not work. "We only broke one thing" yeah, but when every system has 50+ "things" that need to hang together for the whole mess to work right, you're breaking a lot of systems every time. I can still get security updates for Windows 10 on Atom based systems that have been booted out of mainstream linux support, it's the world turned upside down when MS is doing a longer support window than top linux distros. I think windows 10 even beats them on minimum RAM requirement these days, (And I have used it on minimum, it does better on 1GB than windows 7 does, it's as usable as 7 or Vista with 2GB, more like fully patched and SPed XP with 1GB) Anyway, not meaning to come across like an MS troll, just really disappointed by the direction linux seems to be taking in the last few years.

All that info is good BitWrangler. As long as it is civil....😉

Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-09-10, 16:36:

]The Slackware version 14,2 still states i496 class sytems are supported by the huge.s kernel.

Most of the instructions in this version never got updated correctly stating what it supports. The config file for huge.s is set to 586.
https://mirror.slackbuilds.org/slackware/slac … s/huge.s/config

BitWrangler wrote on 2021-09-10, 15:29:

Anyway, not meaning to come across like an MS troll, just really disappointed by the direction linux seems to be taking in the last few years.

No, I think those that depend on linux have been seeing this too. I'd say try another distro, but there aren't many left to choose from that don't have some problem. I've been wanting to give up on slackware, but I've had to keep watch since I want to find a point in time that I can call stable enough, if in the eventuality I have to fork it. But that has been a challenge because I don't consider the 15.x current development branch to be stable at all, even though the dev declared it "RC" but now we are going into months of RC... and "still some left to do". Up to this point, I've been considering 14.1, 14.2, or 15.0 for forking.

I wish I can be a just a linux user, but the modern userspace keeps getting broken. Eventually I'll figure something out, because I'm not throwing away old good systems. BTW, I still use linux on an original atom processor, and actually that is a wonderful 32-bit slackware machine, that still use daily.

the3dfxdude wrote on 2021-09-10, 17:16:

Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-09-10, 16:36:

]The Slackware version 14,2 still states i496 class sytems are supported by the huge.s kernel.

Most of the instructions in this version never got updated correctly stating what it supports. The config file for huge.s is set to 586.
https://mirror.slackbuilds.org/slackware/slac … s/huge.s/config

Cheers. It's nice to see some one that closer to the source if you know what I mean...😉

I've got an Atom based Asus EeeBox with 2gigs of ram and it is running 32-bit LMDE4 fine and it gets updates for everything including the kernel. Ok it is not bleeding edge but hey if it keeps my P4s operational I don't really care.

Ringding wrote on 2021-09-10, 15:39:

What did they kick out and what do you miss more? Only the kernel or the entire 32bit user land?

Well it's kernel/system updates that are cut off I believe, while applications and other projects may or may not continue 32 bit support. I think I got a thing saying Firefox wasn't gonna update any more, but not certain. Everything goes kinda hazy when it's been a few months since my last thrash at it.

Guess what I'm missing at the moment is the sense of losing the "free roaming pass" to the internet, on those machines, not that I deliberately go to dodgy sites, but some of the Russian sites with the intriguing hardware info don't seem to vet their ads too well for example. Then the feeling is getting worse as the unpatched sploits accumulate. So thinking twice and sticking to known sites is the order of the day, no exploring.

Though I've got other ways to do things, I will miss the convenience of interweb secure plus having DOSemu to try stuff on at full speed. I believe it wasn't working on 64 bit, IDK if that changed. Actually there's probably a bunch of stuff that hasn't been properly 64 bit ported, though a lot may work, but older things like synch progs for old handhelds and media players... even though those might already be a bit broken just from kernel changes. Again, a worry about seeking stuff out for them securely, then putting it on them, on the one machine.

Maybe it sounds like I want to switch to Slackqare sorry Skackware damn Slsckware.... I jest... main prob I've come across with Slackware in the past is typo hell in the config files. Though Linux Mint was mentioned before also, was that as staying lightweight only or with 32bit support remaining?

I used 32-bit slackware as my primary OS until a year after 14.2 came out. The main reason I switched later to 64-bit was because the latest browser versions are RAM hogs and don't work well with only 4GB and I didn't want to try PAE at the time. However, I do still use 32-bit slack on my asus eee (atom proc) and it works great, except mainline browsers are quite slow now. So slackware as a choice for 32-bit is still viable. However, the main dev does not seem to use it that rigorously, nor the main contributors, so if they do decide to drop it, it will be because it broke, or it is getting to be too much work to maintain, and not many people actually use it. That could still be years off though.

Although a bit lethargic an older Firefox-esr on Devuan Jessie(When archive status middle of last year) works on a shoe string on my K6-2 400 rig. Fine for this site and some old computer sites. Slackware 14.2 on the same system Firefox-esr is even quicker. Both Linux version boot up to the desktop in under a minute on spinning rust.

Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-09-10, 22:57:

Although a bit lethargic an older Firefox-esr on Devuan Jessie(When archive status middle of last year) works on a shoe string on my K6-2 400 rig. Fine for this site and some old computer sites. Slackware 14.2 on the same system Firefox-esr is even quicker. Both Linux version boot up to the desktop in under a minute on spinning rust.

That's really neat.

One thing to note on these era systems, there were a number of period correct GPUs that had accelerated X drivers back in the day. But in modern linux, they are no longer accelerated. Unless you can somehow get these old drivers versions compiled again that have support. Anyway, here are some tips to consider to bring some of this back in modern linux, courtesy of flaterco:
https://flaterco.com/kb/video/X-regressions.html

Good link, thanks, but holy crap that's grim... I bet if you complain, it'll be like "But can't you see, this is why we're moving to Wayland" ... ummm won't that just extra break the broken, fully break the half broken, and break everything not broken before???

the3dfxdude wrote on 2021-09-10, 23:33:

That's really neat. […]
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Caluser2000 wrote on 2021-09-10, 22:57:

Although a bit lethargic an older Firefox-esr on Devuan Jessie(When archive status middle of last year) works on a shoe string on my K6-2 400 rig. Fine for this site and some old computer sites. Slackware 14.2 on the same system Firefox-esr is even quicker. Both Linux version boot up to the desktop in under a minute on spinning rust.

That's really neat.

One thing to note on these era systems, there were a number of period correct GPUs that had accelerated X drivers back in the day. But in modern linux, they are no longer accelerated. Unless you can somehow get these old drivers versions compiled again that have support. Anyway, here are some tips to consider to bring some of this back in modern linux, courtesy of flaterco:
https://flaterco.com/kb/video/X-regressions.html

Thanks for the link. I've noticed modern 32-bit linux distos seem to set up a generic vesa mode in the xorg.conf file for older kit which has to be altered to get the max resolution. It's not hard to do though. Sometimes I'll attach a Xandros Linux 3 hdd I keep for testing old i586 systems and boot that up then go have a look at it's xorg.conf file to get changes I need for the older videa card. I haven't had Xandos fail to detect the correct video card including nVidea cards yet .I then go and alter the newer linux installation with that info and correct it's xorg.conf then restart Xwindows.

Xandos is a mid 2000s commercial distro that top the code of COREL Linux and ran with. They also supplied a Open Circulation CD like COREL Linux had. Xandros came in three flavors-Bussiness, Deluxe and Standard. I have a box of each....😉 All versions used the 2.4.x kernel.