What to do with a i586 processor

hatten · 2010-03-24 20:02:04

Hello, I got a Gecko Edubook: www.norhtec.com/products/gecko/
I'm not gonna lie, I'm a lazy person, and therefore I love arch linux. Although arch doesn't run on i586. What would you suggest being the easiest way to get this thing up and going, with a basic install featuring like nothing. I love EVERYTHING with arch linux, except for that it doesn't run on i586. I've tried arch for i586, but the project seemed kinda dead, and I gave up. I won't use it for anything else than webbrowsing (uzbl), mplayer, if the graphics can do that, wireless, and terminal programs.

What would you suggest:
Get gentoo on it, either compiling on it or crosscompiling? I don't need to be very up to date, so I won't need to recompile every day.
Get arch i586 working, and compile everything. Crosscompiling?
Get ubuntu/whatever on it, and remove as much as I can without breaking it.
LFS?

I got the computer with ubuntu/wattos and managed to bork X, apt-get, /var and with /var nethack. I use it for school atm, but cannot do much else than edit stuff in vim. Not that I need much more atm, but I will go to paris by bus the 4th, and it would be cool if I could use it for a little more by then. I don't have very much experience with anything else than arch, so it better be well-documented. (Arch is getting me spoiled )

/500 post, yay!

x0rg · 2010-03-24 20:14:09

I've got a server with the same problem. I put Debian Testing on it.
Altough it is a server, I think Debian would be a good choice. Apt isn't as fast as pacman, and overall it requires a bit more fiddling around than arch (speaking of server services though)
but it all works and the apps are not nearly as old as Debian Stable.

Last edited by x0rg (2010-03-24 20:14:17)

.:B:. · 2010-03-24 20:28:38

There was something called lowArch if I'm not mistaken, not sure if it's still alive though.

mianka · 2010-03-24 22:49:44

See: http://archlinux-i586.org/

Last edited by mianka (2010-03-24 22:50:31)

Misfit138 · 2010-03-25 00:04:29

Slitaz or Tiny core seem to fit the bill, if you give up on Arch 586.

hatten · 2010-03-25 07:34:20

@misfit; tiny core looks cool, if it supports the hardwar. Slitaz is a liveCD, which isn't what I'm looking for. Of course I could always move it over to the harddrive and replace openbox with ratpoison etc etc etc.

@mianka; The 'latest news' is 5 months old, and I cannot seem to find the installation media.

Last edited by hatten (2010-03-25 07:37:59)

Bralkein · 2010-03-25 13:10:42

For an older machine like that I'd go with Slackware or Debian. Slack might be missing a few of the more "exotic" packages like uzbl, but compiling them yourself should be okay as long as it's only two or three packages. Compared to Arch and Slack, Debian feels a bit too "clever", but it does have a good package selection and it will also perform well on less powerful hardware; I run Debian on a little ARM SoC and the performance is still good.

I personally wouldn't bother with Gentoo/LFS because I hate waiting for all of the compiling which will obviously be even longer on an older machine, but if you don't mind waiting then I suppose they might be okay, maybe you're more patient that I am

Misfit138 · 2010-03-25 14:03:01

hatten wrote:

@misfit; tiny core looks cool, if it supports the hardwar. Slitaz is a liveCD, which isn't what I'm looking for. Of course I could always move it over to the harddrive and replace openbox with ratpoison etc etc etc.
@mianka; The 'latest news' is 5 months old, and I cannot seem to find the installation media.

So what if Slitaz is a live cd. It installs to a HDD just fine. Check it out. I'll bet you are impressed.

hatten · 2010-03-25 20:12:15

Ha, it's not old! I wonder if it has gotten out to all stores for real yet

Oh yeah, it's not really a problem that slitaz is a LiveCD, but those of the livecd's I've tested haven't been so keen at removing packeges that they have by default, ie wm stuff, and replace it with completely different stuff.
Not that I succeeded with that on ubuntu =P

It's not a huge waste of bandwidth to download slitaz, so I bet I'll try that. If that doesn't fit I bet debian is the next step, and slack if I feel for it.

Ashren · 2010-03-25 20:29:01

Slitaz +1 from here as well. Extremely easy to install manually and it has a good package manager as well.

zowki · 2010-03-25 23:38:45

From the edubook website:

The Edubook will run Windows XP and many x86 Linux Distributions. We have brought up several Linux Distributions to the Edubook, to include, Ubuntu 8.04, Ubuntu Remix, Debian 5, Puppy Linux 4.12, Edubuntu, Zen and many others. We are currently shipping the Edubook with WattOS. WattOS is a fast and efficient Linux distribution based on Ubuntu 9.04.

And out of curiosity where can you buy an edubook? I never bought a netbook before but I find this interesting.

Last edited by zowki (2010-03-25 23:41:37)

austin.rbn · 2010-03-26 03:42:00

zowki wrote:

From the edubook website:
The Edubook will run Windows XP and many x86 Linux Distributions. We have brought up several Linux Distributions to the Edubook, to include, Ubuntu 8.04, Ubuntu Remix, Debian 5, Puppy Linux 4.12, Edubuntu, Zen and many others. We are currently shipping the Edubook with WattOS. WattOS is a fast and efficient Linux distribution based on Ubuntu 9.04.
And out of curiosity where can you buy an edubook? I never bought a netbook before but I find this interesting.

A google search for "edubook" yields...
http://www.norhtec.com/products/gecko/index.html (There's an "Order Now" link at the bottom)

Oh, and regarding the topic, I'll second the recommendations for Debian. It seems to be ideal as a solid and mostly nonbloated distro which will run on nearly anything.

Bralkein · 2010-03-26 04:20:51

hatten wrote:

Ha, it's not old! I wonder if it has gotten out to all stores for real yet

Blah, sorry, I clicked the link, looked at the photos but still my brain insisted i586 == old ::rolleyes:

hatten · 2010-03-26 14:25:04

@zowki: Order from the website. It's awesome to be able to pop in some spare aa's! Although the quality and i586-ness of it isn't the best. Be prepared to look for loose plastic parts if you drop it.

I'm off to play at a concert now, we'll see if I get slitaz/debian after that.

hatten · 2010-03-28 18:28:19

Okay, debian threw a kernel panic at me, or one per boot attempt.
Slitaz worked, but it doesn't pick up my network card (not surprising) nor audio (not so surprising either). setxkbmap didn't exist, and it failed at setting dvorak as keyboard layout at boot, even though it gave me a menu for choosing. ePDFview refuses to do what I want it to do (fullscreen and adjust to width). If I'm gonna use Slitaz daily I'll need to use it's package manager a lot, and compile zathura =p

I'm gonna ask norhtec if they can put up a bunch of iso's/patches at the website, or at least upload them somewhere. As they said they got a bunch of distros going.

Last edited by hatten (2010-03-28 18:30:29)

Arch Linux

#1 2010-03-24 20:02:04

What to do with a i586 processor

#2 2010-03-24 20:14:09

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#3 2010-03-24 20:28:38

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#4 2010-03-24 22:49:44

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#5 2010-03-25 00:04:29

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#6 2010-03-25 07:34:20

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#7 2010-03-25 13:10:42

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#8 2010-03-25 14:03:01

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#9 2010-03-25 20:12:15

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#10 2010-03-25 20:29:01

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#11 2010-03-25 23:38:45

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#12 2010-03-26 03:42:00

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#13 2010-03-26 04:20:51

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#14 2010-03-26 14:25:04

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

#15 2010-03-28 18:28:19

Re: What to do with a i586 processor

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