Old Hardware Rant

[Brian Densmore]

I've never had a problem getting Linux to run graphical mode on a 486, p75,
p90. Granted some of the video cards are buggy, and some of the graphical
installs don't work on some of the older hardware. In fact my internet
server is running on a p75, and it hasn't been down once since I put it
online. also you should be able to find the sync rates for the monitor from
the manufacturer's website. also there is a file that lists just about any
monitor's sync rate, you might want to check out the Linux Documentation
site, or the X11 website.

Brian

If you use cheap hardware, don't expect your data to thank you.
 ;')

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jonathan Hutchins [mailto:hutchins at opus1.com]
> Sent: Monday, May 14, 2001 9:27 AM
> To: kclug at kclug.org
> Subject: Old Hardware Rant
> 
> 
> Sorry, it wasn't LJ, it was Linux Magazine in February, 
> reviewing Merilus
> Gateway Guardian.  They open with this blah about how this is 
> a great use
> for "a pile of old 486 machines sitting around", but then recommend a
> minimum of a P266 with at least 64M.
> 
> I recently set up a new PC to replace an old 486, and installed both
> Windows95 and Mandrake 7.2.  I had no problems with the 
> install or setup of
> either, but when I delivered the machine it would run just fine under
> Windows 95 at 800x600x24b (may have been higher but I'm sure 
> of that), but
> would not run X-windows at any resolution on the existing 
> monitor.  The
> monitor is some discount brand 15" three to five years old, 
> and there's no
> chance at all of ever finding a sync rate table for it, so I 
> guess that
> system will run Windows until and unless a different monitor is found.
> 
> (Yeah, I know, I could walk through a table of possible sync 
> rates tweaking
> the config file and testing each possibility, and I'd probably find
> something that would at least run 640x480, as if that were 
> any good for X.
> But it's not mine, it's not at my house, and I don't have 
> three or four
> hours to put into a $500 system.)
> 
> At a shop where we had some fairly decent older Compaqs that 
> were running
> NT, and would have been fine for Windows 95, I tried Mandrake, Redhat,
> Storm,and Turbo Linux CD installations.  Most of them failed 
> at the point
> where they tried to go into the Graphical install on all of 
> the machines
> through the P200's.  None of them completed successfully.
> 
> That means the average consumer couldn't even install Linux 
> on a name-brand
> PC as recent as three years old.  Pretty pitiful.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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