Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.
Dismiss

Installing Debian with only 64mb RAM

31 views
Skip to first unread message

peter.sch...@t-online.de

unread,
Apr 18, 2015, 9:50:03 AM4/18/15
to
Hi there,
I've found an old laptop (MAXDATA Artist Stanford) with 64mb ram and tried to install a minimal Debian system. The installer warned me about low system memory but I could continue. I didn't select any additional kernel module and continued again. After loading basic system components (like lilo installer, netcfg etc) the system showed a black screen with a white flashing cursor. And that's it. The installer doesn't go forward.
How can I complete my Debian installation? I tried to add lowmem=2 and lowmem=1 to the boot options of the Debian installer, but the problem stays unresolved.
Can I disable network support (I saw that the system tried to load wpasupplicant and so on which I don't need)? Or is it possible to use a swap partition or a “swap usb-stick” for the installer?

If there is no solution with the Debian installer, is it possible to install Debian manually?

Thank you for any help!

Peter


----------------------------------------------------------------
Profitieren Sie von der sicheren E-Mail-Übertragung Ihrer Daten mit einer kostenlosen E-Mail-Adresse der Telekom.
www.t-online.de/email-kostenlos



--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/165673951755325f...@email.t-online.de

Kirill Shilov

unread,
Apr 18, 2015, 12:50:02 PM4/18/15
to
hi Peter, try install via debootstrap. more information you can find on debian wiki.

Bob Proulx

unread,
Apr 18, 2015, 4:20:03 PM4/18/15
to
peter.sch...@t-online.de wrote:
> I've found an old laptop (MAXDATA Artist Stanford) with 64mb ram and
> tried to install a minimal Debian system. The installer warned me
> about low system memory but I could continue. I didn't select any
> additional kernel module and continued again. After loading basic
> system components (like lilo installer, netcfg etc) the system
> showed a black screen with a white flashing cursor. And that's
> it. The installer doesn't go forward.

I worry that much older hardware has had hardware support dropped from
the upstream Linux kernel. I have run into similar problems with
quite newer hardware. You may have a case where you must run an older
kernel rather than a newer kernel.

> How can I complete my Debian installation?

If I were doing this I would use one of these strategies.

1. I would install an *older* version of Debian. Something from the
Sarge 3.1 timeframe might be good for that system. Or perhaps Etch 4.
Use that for installation. Install the minimum system. Then
*upgrade* as far as you can through each of the major releases. Sarge
3.1 to Etch 4. Etch 4 to Lenny 5. Lenny 5 to Squeeze 6. And so
forth. Stop at each major version testing functionality at such a
point that you can revert to the previous kernel if needed.

2. Remove the disk drive from the laptop. Install the disk drive into
a different system with more memory. A desktop with a laptop IDE
adaptor cable would be perfect. Remove the cable from any other disk
in the system so that only the laptop disk is available to the larger
memory desktop system. Then install Debian on that system. Install
just the minimum system. Then transfer the disk back into the laptop.

3. Use a livecd boot. Install using debootstrap. The Debian wiki has
instructions for this process. Due to the low memory I think the
livecd boot will be more painfully slow.

4. Other things I didn't think of but other people will think of and
suggest. :-)

Good luck!

Bob
signature.asc

Michael

unread,
Apr 18, 2015, 10:10:02 PM4/18/15
to
Have a look here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightweight_Linux_distribution

Yes, with an old Laptop one really should chose a rather old kernel, but then, the latest 'stable' Debian possibly will not run on that thing (for example, systemd). So you would either chose an old Debian in the first place, or use some specialised minimal Linux.

64 M is a tough condition. Maybe you're already in the 'embedded systems' class with this ...

ps. Maybe obvious, but still, for the final OS, you could install only a windowmanager as minimalistic desktop, for example, fluxbox or Windowmaker. Better not install a KDE or Gnome session.


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/20150419040...@mirrors.kernel.org

Reco

unread,
Apr 19, 2015, 5:40:03 AM4/19/15
to
Hi.

On Sun, 19 Apr 2015 04:04:00 +0200
Michael <codej...@gmx.ch> wrote:

> Have a look here
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightweight_Linux_distribution
>
> Yes, with an old Laptop one really should chose a rather old kernel, but then, the latest 'stable' Debian possibly will not run on that thing (for example, systemd). So you would either chose an old Debian in the first place, or use some specialised minimal Linux.

You should try it one day. Swap is a must, and it's unlikely that
you'll manage to run GNOME on such hardware, but still:

$ free -m | cut -c -62
total used free shared buffers
Mem: 52 50 1 3 0
-/+ buffers/cache: 40 11
Swap: 714 48 666

$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Debian
Description: Debian GNU/Linux 8.0 (jessie)
Release: 8.0
Codename: jessie


Installing the thing involved debootstrap, but then again - debootstrap
is one of the few ways to get a minimal Debian installation anyway.


> 64 M is a tough condition. Maybe you're already in the 'embedded systems' class with this ...

No. 'Embedded' ends if your RAM exceeds 1M. In that case you really
need stripped-down kernel. 64M is plenty as long as you don't run X
with all the bells and whistles.

Reco


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/20150419123840.bc09...@gmail.com

Eric S Fraga

unread,
Apr 19, 2015, 6:20:02 AM4/19/15
to
On Saturday, 18 Apr 2015 at 15:43, peter.sch...@t-online.de wrote:
> Hi there,
> I've found an old laptop (MAXDATA Artist Stanford) with 64mb ram and
> tried to install a minimal Debian system. The installer warned me

I cannot help you directly but you may wish to consider one of the
Debian derivatives that targets small systems. DSL (Damn Small Linux)
is probably one of the better known ones:

http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/

and claims to be small enough to run on a i486 with 16 MB of RAM...

I've never tried it, mind you. My smallest system has 256 MB of RAM so
very large in comparison! :)

--
: Eric S Fraga, GnuPG: 0xFFFCF67D
: in Emacs 25.0.50.1 + Ma Gnus v0.12 + evil-git-bdeb602
: BBDB version 3.1.2 (2014-05-06 11:45:08 -0500)


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/87vbgso...@ucl.ac.uk

Celejar

unread,
Apr 19, 2015, 8:10:02 AM4/19/15
to
On Sun, 19 Apr 2015 12:38:40 +0300
Reco <recov...@gmail.com> wrote:

...


> No. 'Embedded' ends if your RAM exceeds 1M. In that case you really
> need stripped-down kernel. 64M is plenty as long as you don't run X
> with all the bells and whistles.

Whose definition of embedded is this? Cheap, low end consumer grade
routers these days usually have at least 4 MB of RAM - and I just
checked the homepage of the OpenWrt wiki, and noticed a note referring
to "lower end devices with only 16 MiB RAM". Are you saying that these
are not considered embedded?

Celejar


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/20150419080410.5531...@gmail.com

Reco

unread,
Apr 19, 2015, 9:00:02 AM4/19/15
to
Hi.

On Sun, 19 Apr 2015 08:04:10 -0400
Celejar <cel...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Sun, 19 Apr 2015 12:38:40 +0300
> Reco <recov...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> ...
>
>
> > No. 'Embedded' ends if your RAM exceeds 1M. In that case you really
> > need stripped-down kernel. 64M is plenty as long as you don't run X
> > with all the bells and whistles.
>
> Whose definition of embedded is this?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embedded_system

[CPU] Word lengths vary from 4-bit to 64-bits and beyond, although the
most typical remain 8/16-bit.


Linux's minimum requirement of 32 bits is really pushing the limit of
"embedded".


> Cheap, low end consumer grade
> routers these days usually have at least 4 MB of RAM - and I just
> checked the homepage of the OpenWrt wiki, and noticed a note referring
> to "lower end devices with only 16 MiB RAM". Are you saying that these
> are not considered embedded?

As long as you can install additional software - it's not "embedded".
OpenWrt is the full-blown multipurpose OS. The real "embedded" system
consists of OS kernel and one single userspace program. And that's it.

True, it's considered easier to patch a Linux kernel and write some
PHP-based (end inevitably - full of security holes) "web-application"
to manage a router. Which, along with a router can serve as
file-server, torrent seed-box and brewing a coffee :)
Hence OpenWrt, dd-wrt, and a hundred of their clones.

Good examples of embedded system include (but aren't limited, of
course) Sun's ILOM, HP's BMC or that thing they put instead of OS into
every SIM-card in existence.

Reco


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/20150419154955.d9e1...@gmail.com

Hans dinsen-hansen

unread,
Apr 19, 2015, 11:50:03 AM4/19/15
to
On 4/18/15, peter.sch...@t-online.de
<peter.sch...@t-online.de> wrote:
> Hi there,
> I've found an old laptop (MAXDATA Artist Stanford) with 64mb ram and tried
> to install a minimal Debian system. The installer warned me about low system
> memory but I could continue. I didn't select any additional kernel module
> and continued again. After loading basic system components (like lilo
> installer, netcfg etc) the system showed a black screen with a white
> flashing cursor. And that's it. The installer doesn't go forward.
> How can I complete my Debian installation? I tried to add lowmem=2 and
> lowmem=1 to the boot options of the Debian installer, but the problem stays
> unresolved.
> Can I disable network support (I saw that the system tried to load
> wpasupplicant and so on which I don't need)? Or is it possible to use a swap
> partition or a “swap usb-stick” for the installer?
>
> If there is no solution with the Debian installer, is it possible to install
> Debian manually?
>
> Thank you for any help!
>
> Peter

Hi Peter.

I have seen the various answers to your post. There is the possibillity
to use quite another system. Personally, O am scrapping my Microsoft
systems and considering to go Debian. As open system I have used NetBSD.
But there ate some problems with a few non-open systems, which can run
on Linux.

My advice is to use NetBSD on your "tiny" system. Look at is home-page,
http://www.netbsd.org/ , and study the NetBSD Guide a bit. It is found at
http://www.netbsd.org/docs/guide/en/index.html

There are some terms which wil be new to you. The first disk is called wd0.
It contains a "disk label" which describes how 'one* *single* BIOS partition is
used. That is, there are no special BIOS partitions for booting, swap, home,
et cetera.

I am certain that you can get it to run smoothly on your laptop. Do not forget
to look into the packet system, where you will find the extras that
you may need.

Good luck with your tiny system.

Hans


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/CAP48nAaWXtAN-NJo3tBbK-dD...@mail.gmail.com

Celejar

unread,
Apr 19, 2015, 6:20:02 PM4/19/15
to
On Sun, 19 Apr 2015 15:49:55 +0300
Reco <recov...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi.
>
> On Sun, 19 Apr 2015 08:04:10 -0400
> Celejar <cel...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Sun, 19 Apr 2015 12:38:40 +0300
> > Reco <recov...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > ...
> >
> >
> > > No. 'Embedded' ends if your RAM exceeds 1M. In that case you really
> > > need stripped-down kernel. 64M is plenty as long as you don't run X
> > > with all the bells and whistles.
> >
> > Whose definition of embedded is this?
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embedded_system
>
> [CPU] Word lengths vary from 4-bit to 64-bits and beyond, although the
> most typical remain 8/16-bit.
>
>
> Linux's minimum requirement of 32 bits is really pushing the limit of
> "embedded".

Your opinion, but you haven't provided any real source for your
stringent definition.

> > Cheap, low end consumer grade
> > routers these days usually have at least 4 MB of RAM - and I just
> > checked the homepage of the OpenWrt wiki, and noticed a note referring
> > to "lower end devices with only 16 MiB RAM". Are you saying that these
> > are not considered embedded?
>
> As long as you can install additional software - it's not "embedded".
> OpenWrt is the full-blown multipurpose OS. The real "embedded" system
> consists of OS kernel and one single userspace program. And that's it.
>
> True, it's considered easier to patch a Linux kernel and write some
> PHP-based (end inevitably - full of security holes) "web-application"
> to manage a router. Which, along with a router can serve as
> file-server, torrent seed-box and brewing a coffee :)
> Hence OpenWrt, dd-wrt, and a hundred of their clones.
>
> Good examples of embedded system include (but aren't limited, of
> course) Sun's ILOM, HP's BMC or that thing they put instead of OS into
> every SIM-card in existence.

Okay, so you just basically disagree with the OpenWrt devs on the
definition of embedded:

"OpenWrt is described as a Linux distribution for embedded devices."

Celejar


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/20150419181910.2697...@gmail.com

Bob Proulx

unread,
Apr 20, 2015, 2:20:02 AM4/20/15
to
Celejar wrote:
> Reco wrote:
> > Linux's minimum requirement of 32 bits is really pushing the limit of
> > "embedded".
>
> Your opinion, but you haven't provided any real source for your
> stringent definition.

It isn't completely black and white. It is a gray scale. But
generally by the time you get to use malloc() without thought is when
it is no longer an "embedded" system. Having a full Linux kernel
available really pushes the definition of embedded. Even if there is
"Embedded Linux".

> > As long as you can install additional software - it's not "embedded".
> > OpenWrt is the full-blown multipurpose OS. The real "embedded" system
> > consists of OS kernel and one single userspace program. And that's it.

I think OpenWRT is right on the line. I find it very restricted. But
at the same time it isn't writing an application in assembly.

> Okay, so you just basically disagree with the OpenWrt devs on the
> definition of embedded:
>
> "OpenWrt is described as a Linux distribution for embedded devices."

I do have WRT54GL boxes that can install OpenWRT, Tomato, DD-WRT, and
the others. But most of the WRT54G series had too little memory and
flash and couldn't install other firmware bundles.

It is a long gray scale. It really isn't quite so black and white.

Bob


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/20150420001...@bob.proulx.com

Norbert X

unread,
Apr 20, 2015, 6:10:02 AM4/20/15
to

Hello!

For me it seems that you changed discussion theme to terminology, but topic starter need Debian-based solution.

So I suggest to choose Debian-based distribution on Distrowatch.com for the old computers with i386 arch ( http://distrowatch.com/search.php?ostype=All&category=Old+Computers&origin=All&basedon=Debian&notbasedon=None&desktop=All&architecture=i386&status=Active ).
For example wattOS may suite all needs.

According to gentoo wiki Pentium II is i686 ( http://www.gentoo-wiki.info/Safe_Cflags#Pentium_II ). You can try other Debian-base  distro - AntiX on it.

If Debian-only solution is not really needed you can choose from other distros ( http://distrowatch.com/search.php?ostype=All&category=Old+Computers&origin=All&basedon=All&notbasedon=Debian&desktop=All&architecture=i386&status=Active ). In that case Puppy Linux looks as the best solution.

With best regards,
Norbert.



----Пользователь Bob Proulx написал ----

llcfree

unread,
Apr 20, 2015, 8:20:02 AM4/20/15
to
On Mon, 2015-04-20 at 13:03 +0400, Norbert X wrote:
>
> So I suggest to choose Debian-based distribution on Distrowatch.com
> for the old computers with i386 arch
> ( http://distrowatch.com/search.php?ostype=All&category=Old
> +Computers&origin=All&basedon=Debian&notbasedon=None&desktop=All&architecture=i386&status=Active ).
> For example wattOS may suite all needs.

Unfortunately, "based on debian" is not the same as debian, one loses
the amazing quality, stability, security and community support typical
of debian.

I looked myself a while ago for a pure blend debian distribution for a
very low resource machine and I ended up with building it from bottom
up, starting with a base system.

As already pointed up, the basic problem is the linux kernel moving
forward, often without maintaining backward compatibility with older
hardware. Thus, first make sure that the kernel supports your hardware.
You may need to re-compile the kernel if it does not.

If you can live without graphics you are done. If you need a graphics
environment, then you should choose the one that does not exhaust your
limited resources. Do the same for any application you install and run.
So, focus of what you want and can do with the little old beast, and
only install what you need.

> According to gentoo wiki Pentium II is i686
> ( http://www.gentoo-wiki.info/Safe_Cflags#Pentium_II ). You can try
> other Debian-base distro - AntiX on it.
>
> If Debian-only solution is not really needed you can choose from other
> distros ( http://distrowatch.com/search.php?ostype=All&category=Old
> +Computers&origin=All&basedon=All&notbasedon=Debian&desktop=All&architecture=i386&status=Active ). In that case Puppy Linux looks as the best solution.

I was very pleasantly surprised by slitaz:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SliTaz_GNU/Linux
http://www.slitaz.org/en/

It is extremely light, it boots on almost eveything and even provides a
very elegant graphical interface.

The only drawback: it is not debian (:

It would be great to have something like slitaz as part of debian,
perhaps even only a "cookbook" about how to build it would do (maybe the
recipe for debian is there somewhere and I missed it?)

In any case, the easiest way is to download a live distribution and boot
from it. If you end up with a text or graphical console, you have a
chance, if not, simply go to the next candidate.

Loredana



--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/1429531663.2...@merletti-1.polito.it

Jan-Rens Reitsma

unread,
Apr 20, 2015, 8:20:02 AM4/20/15
to
On 04/18/2015 03:43 PM, peter.sch...@t-online.de wrote:
> Hi there,
> I've found an old laptop (MAXDATA Artist Stanford) with 64mb ram and tried to install a minimal Debian system. The installer warned me about low system memory but I could continue. I didn't select any additional kernel module and continued again. After loading basic system components (like lilo installer, netcfg etc) the system showed a black screen with a white flashing cursor. And that's it. The installer doesn't go forward.
> How can I complete my Debian installation? I tried to add lowmem=2 and lowmem=1 to the boot options of the Debian installer, but the problem stays unresolved.
> Can I disable network support (I saw that the system tried to load wpasupplicant and so on which I don't need)? Or is it possible to use a swap partition or a “swap usb-stick” for the installer?
>
> If there is no solution with the Debian installer, is it possible to install Debian manually?

Maybe the Debian kFreeBSD kernel is smaller.
>
> Thank you for any help!
>
> Peter

Kind regards,
Jan-Rens.



--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/5534EE88...@gmail.com

Stefan Monnier

unread,
Apr 27, 2015, 9:20:02 AM4/27/15
to
> need stripped-down kernel. 64M is plenty as long as you don't run X
> with all the bells and whistles.

I have also run Debian on my ASUS WL-700gE, but I wouldn't say that 64MB
is "plenty" to run Debian. For my day-to-day use (mostly as
router+NAS+jukebox) it was indeed sufficient, but doing upgrades via
`apt-get' (which I consider as one of the cornerstones of Debian) was
fairly painful.


Stefan


--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-lap...@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listm...@lists.debian.org
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/jwvy4ld7m1s.fsf-monnier+gma...@gnu.org

Aleksandar Atanasov

unread,
Apr 28, 2015, 11:40:02 AM4/28/15
to
Hi!

You should really think about what you need this for and if Debian can
provide it for you. If you want to run something really lightweight
there are distros specifically designed for this and frankly even a
stripped down Debian is not meant for it. This requirement for such a
low amount of RAM seems to me to be some sort of an embedded project you
are working on (if you want more help, it would be useful to provide
more information about what exactly are you trying to achieve) in which
case I'd also suggest to looks somewhere else as long as the support for
many architectures of Debian is not what you require.

Regards,
Aleksandar
Archive: https://lists.debian.org/553FA79A...@gmail.com
0 new messages