Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

Torignit · 2016-05-15 05:45:27

I was naively going through Method A here with an old version of Damn Small Linux on a computer with a 480M HD, 630M RAM, and a Pentium II processor, when I hit a snag.
Upon attempting to actually chroot (the other steps looking like they worked) I get:
"FATAL: kernel too old"

Solutions to this would be nice, but my main question is; is what I'm trying to do even technically possible?
Or perhaps; do I even have enough HD space and it just failed to give an error during tar xzf?

TheSaint · 2016-05-15 05:56:21

By my knowledge I'd rather opt for the ISO installation. (Methode B)
As such, you won't face incompatibilities.

Torignit · 2016-05-15 06:09:05

Well, this system does not have a working CD or DVD drive. I could perhaps use a 'LiveCD' on a USB drive...but first I would need to download the iso and write it to my usb drive, and I'm about 300M short for that. Also would need to get 'the latest version of squashfs' although that sounds like a more surmountable problem.

I guess I will just need to wait until I can get a more modern system running again.

alex.theoto · 2016-05-15 07:01:08

480mb hdd?
I don't know if you can install in such a small disk. (keep in mind that pacman saves the installed packages so you might need an external usb for extra storage)

bstaletic · 2016-05-15 09:18:13

If your kernel is really too old just copy a newer one from another distro. I'm also not sure about 480mb HDD, with a minimal desktop I'm at about 2GB. I guess removing xorg and everything running on it I could get another 1GB freed up. That's still twice as much needed space than you have.

Trilby · 2016-05-15 12:47:26

The installed size of all base packages on my system (I've removed several base packages too):

$ pacman -Qi $(pacman -Qgq base) | awk '/Size/ { if ($5 == "MiB") total +=  $4 * 1024; else total += $4; } END { print total / 1024; }'
319.794

That's 320 MiB just for the installed size of most of the base group. Many of these also generate files after install or on first use (two kernel images ~ 24 MiB). So even assuming no pkg.tar.gz files were ever cached, you *might*be able to just squeeze a base install into 480 MB (MB or MiB?), but you wouldn't be able to do anything with it. You couldn't install any other packages (and a base arch install doesn't include much).

With 480 MiB, look for a distro made to be small. Arch is designed to be "simple" but it is definitely not small. Slitaz seems like a good distro for small.

Scimmia · 2016-05-15 12:51:50

You can get the install size of the base install down considerably by stripping down the kernel and firmware packages. Those take well over 200 MB, and you likely use less than 10% of that.

Trilby · 2016-05-15 12:55:23

Scimmia, wouldn't that involve recompiling the kernel? Recompiling a modern kernel on the hardware described in the OP would be somewhere between ridiculously masochistic and impossible (probably just impossible).

Scimmia · 2016-05-15 12:58:19

Not necessarily, you could simply strip modules. Rebuilding is better, though. The firmware is easier nothing to build), and is 135 MB itself.

This all may be moot, though, as he specifies that he's installing to USB in the thread title.

Last edited by Scimmia (2016-05-15 12:59:04)

R00KIE · 2016-05-15 13:43:10

If the problem is downloading the iso then you could probably do "wget arch_download_url -O /dev/sdX" where sdX is the device node of a usb flash drive you will use to boot and install arch from.

That said, with a 480MB/MiB hard disk you will always be short on space, so with that disk I'm not sure arch is the best option.

TheSaint · 2016-05-15 13:45:18

Another way should be to install into 2 GB pendrive, saving the HDD space.

Arch Linux

#1 2016-05-15 05:45:27

Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#2 2016-05-15 05:56:21

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#3 2016-05-15 06:09:05

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#4 2016-05-15 07:01:08

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#5 2016-05-15 09:18:13

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#6 2016-05-15 12:47:26

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#7 2016-05-15 12:51:50

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#8 2016-05-15 12:55:23

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#9 2016-05-15 12:58:19

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#10 2016-05-15 13:43:10

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

#11 2016-05-15 13:45:18

Re: Installing Arch latest to a USB drive from an ancient system

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