Re: ..when to scrap old junk, was: old machine wheezy vs apt
Hi, On Tue, Apr 17, 2012 at 10:18:16PM +0200, Arnt Karlsen wrote: On Tue, 17 Apr 2012 15:10:38 +0100, Dom wrote in message 4f8d79de.20...@rpdom.net: On 16/04/12 21:34, Aleksandar Kostadinov wrote: To anybody interested, debian wheezy can't run on 64MB RAM on i386. Or actually it can run but package management is unusable so all debian benefits are actually lost. Hmmm I have not tried recently but Debian i386 was for 486 or newer for good long time. http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/i386/ch02s01.html.en#id583669 | However, Debian GNU/Linux squeeze will not run on 386 or earlier | processors. Despite the architecture name i386, support for actual | 80386 processors (and their clones) was dropped with the Sarge (r3.1) | release of Debian[2]. (No version of Linux has ever supported the 286 or | earlier chips in the series.) All i486 and later processors are still | supported[3]. ... | [2] We have long tried to avoid this, but in the end it was necessary | due a unfortunate series of issues with the compiler and the kernel, | starting with an bug in the C++ ABI provided by GCC. You should still be | able to run Debian GNU/Linux on actual 80386 processors if you compile | your own kernel and compile all packages from source, but that is beyond | the scope of this manual. | [3] Many Debian packages will actually run slightly faster on modern | computers as a positive side effect of dropping support for these old | chips. The i486, introduced in 1989, has three opcodes (bswap, cmpxchg, | and xadd) which the i386, introduced in 1986, did not have. Previously, | these could not be easily used by most Debian packages; now they can. This is not RAM size issue but CPU code compatibility issue. I tried pulling the .deb files on another machine, then transfer to the old machine. But dpkg is killed on 95% reading database (I think OOM killer). It fails even if I try to install 1 package. So install Woddy (r3.0) from old archive ... -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/20120419132455.GA8136@localhost
Re: ..when to scrap old junk, was: old machine wheezy vs apt
On Wednesday 18 April 2012 20:14:45 Indulekha wrote: There is a special appeal in the challenge of keeping obsolete machines alive, and a unique form of satifaction in not indulging in the rampant consumerism that surrounds us too. +1 :-) Lisi -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/201204192048.54048.lisi.re...@gmail.com
..when to scrap old junk, was: old machine wheezy vs apt
On Tue, 17 Apr 2012 15:10:38 +0100, Dom wrote in message 4f8d79de.20...@rpdom.net: On 16/04/12 21:34, Aleksandar Kostadinov wrote: To anybody interested, debian wheezy can't run on 64MB RAM on i386. Or actually it can run but package management is unusable so all debian benefits are actually lost. I tried pulling the .deb files on another machine, then transfer to the old machine. But dpkg is killed on 95% reading database (I think OOM killer). It fails even if I try to install 1 package. I run a basic Wheezy system on old machines with 64MB or 32MB of RAM on i386. I agree that the package management is almost unusable without work. What I do for a start is run a cutomised kernel with just the necessary drivers for those machines built in. Smaller kernel = more memory free for other things. Any devices other than the built in ones are supported via kernel modules when needed. Also, and this is the important thing, I have my own cut-down version of the Wheezy repository running on a slightly more powerful machine. By reducing the Packages file to just the packages that I use, the time and memory needed to process them comes down from hours to a few minutes. I realise that I'm not going to be able to keep these machines running for much longer, but I'll keep trying for as long as I can. ..do the math on power, maintenance etc cost on keeping the old junk running vs doing it e.g in a virtual machine on a newer host iron, you may find that the newer iron adds academic profits such as learning to run virtual machines. ..then again, in some climates, you _may_ have a use for the 100W or 300W or so of waste heat generated by that old iron. ..waste heat value: Say 150W @ .5NOK/kWh and per year? arnt@celsius:~$ qalc 150W*1year*.5NOK/kWh to $ warning: It has been more than one week since the exchange rates last were updated. (150 * watt * (1 * year) * (0.5 * NOK)) / (kilowatt * hour) = approx. $110.73655 arnt@celsius:~$ -- ..med vennlig hilsen = with Kind Regards from Arnt Karlsen ...with a number of polar bear hunters in his ancestry... Scenarios always come in sets of three: best case, worst case, and just in case. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/20120417221816.19dde...@nb6.lan
Re: ..when to scrap old junk, was: old machine wheezy vs apt
On 17/04/12 21:18, Arnt Karlsen wrote: On Tue, 17 Apr 2012 15:10:38 +0100, Dom wrote in message 4f8d79de.20...@rpdom.net: I realise that I'm not going to be able to keep these machines running for much longer, but I'll keep trying for as long as I can. ..do the math on power, maintenance etc cost on keeping the old junk running vs doing it e.g in a virtual machine on a newer host iron, you may find that the newer iron adds academic profits such as learning to run virtual machines. ..then again, in some climates, you _may_ have a use for the 100W or 300W or so of waste heat generated by that old iron. ..waste heat value: Say 150W @ .5NOK/kWh and per year? arnt@celsius:~$ qalc 150W*1year*.5NOK/kWh to $ warning: It has been more than one week since the exchange rates last were updated. (150 * watt * (1 * year) * (0.5 * NOK)) / (kilowatt * hour) = approx. $110.73655 arnt@celsius:~$ Done the math many times :-) These little machines take about 30W max, are only used for an average of an hour a day. As for running costs? Peanuts. Heat output? Barely noticable. My main laptop is slightly newer and about 10x the power. I have other systems, but nothing modern - I don't have the funds to get anything newer. Besides, it's a fun challenge to keep the old ones running. I enjoy it :) -- Dom -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/4f8efb4a.2000...@rpdom.net
Re: ..when to scrap old junk, was: old machine wheezy vs apt
On Wed, April 18, 2012 10:35 am, Dom wrote: These little machines take about 30W max, are only used for an average of an hour a day. As for running costs? Peanuts. Heat output? Barely noticable. My main laptop is slightly newer and about 10x the power. I have other systems, but nothing modern - I don't have the funds to get anything newer. Besides, it's a fun challenge to keep the old ones running. I enjoy it :) I can relate to those points and wonder what fraction of CPU cycles in the world, execute application code. Could easily believe a number less than 1%. Great improvements of efficiency should be possible in many aspects computing. Regards, ... Peter E. -- Telephone 1 360 639 0202. Bcc: peter at easthope.ca http://carnot.yi.org/ http://members.shaw.ca/peasthope/index.html#Itinerary -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/903ab8804b4e5de1d27b9d5dd3436ebc.squir...@easthope.ca
Re: ..when to scrap old junk, was: old machine wheezy vs apt
Dom to...@rpdom.net wrote: On 17/04/12 21:18, Arnt Karlsen wrote: On Tue, 17 Apr 2012 15:10:38 +0100, Dom wrote in message 4f8d79de.20...@rpdom.net: I realise that I'm not going to be able to keep these machines running for much longer, but I'll keep trying for as long as I can. ..do the math on power, maintenance etc cost on keeping the old junk running vs doing it e.g in a virtual machine on a newer host iron, you may find that the newer iron adds academic profits such as learning to run virtual machines. ..then again, in some climates, you _may_ have a use for the 100W or 300W or so of waste heat generated by that old iron. ..waste heat value: Say 150W @ .5NOK/kWh and per year? arnt@celsius:~$ qalc 150W*1year*.5NOK/kWh to $ warning: It has been more than one week since the exchange rates last were updated. (150 * watt * (1 * year) * (0.5 * NOK)) / (kilowatt * hour) = approx. $110.73655 arnt@celsius:~$ Done the math many times :-) These little machines take about 30W max, are only used for an average of an hour a day. As for running costs? Peanuts. Heat output? Barely noticable. My main laptop is slightly newer and about 10x the power. I have other systems, but nothing modern - I don't have the funds to get anything newer. Besides, it's a fun challenge to keep the old ones running. I enjoy it :) -- There is a special appeal in the challenge of keeping obsolete machines alive, and a unique form of satifaction in not indulging in the rampant consumerism that surrounds us too. -- ❤ ♫ ❤ ♫ ❤ ♫ ❤ Indulekha -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/20120418191445.GA4765@radhesyama
