Roy Schestowitz wrote:
> __/ [ Richard Rasker ] on Friday 01 September 2006 01:11 \__
>
> > Another night, another Linux install - but somehow, this one was a bit
> > special. Some context: I had a customer over for some simple repair work,
> > and as I fixed her TV while she waited, she mentioned that the family
> > computer had rather terminally (as in: won't boot) succumbed to malware
> > once again, and asked if I could fix that too.
> >
> > Turns out she was talking about a seven year old Compaq with an AMD Athlon
> > 650 MHz, only 128MB of RAM and equally ancient video and sound cards.
> > They had already tried reinstalling Windows 98, but the Compaq "Quick
> > Restore Disk" crapped out after the first two screens with the cryptic
> > and totally useless message "Compaq Quick Restore Error 812:14 -
> > Contact Your Dealer". Attempts to install from a full W98SE install CD
> > all failed because half the hardware drivers were nowhere to be found.
> > There were no CD's, naturally, because everything was supposed to be
> > loaded from the restore disk; the Internet turned up more dead links than
> > live ones, and after two days(!) of trying and endless rebooting, they
> > gave up.
> >
> > Problem was, they're not the most wealthy people, to put it mildly, and
> > didn't have three hundred euros to spare for a new machine, let alone
> > double that amount for Windows, MS Office and all the other applications.
> >
> > I offered to install Linux, but when I heard about the system specs, I
> > thought running KDE would be a *big* problem. Especially the mere 128MB of
> > RAM was quite worrisome. I almost gave up in advance, but then decided to
> > give it a try anyway - nothing ventured, nothing gained, and these people
> > were really up a certain creek without a certain implement.
> > As I started the install, I warned them that both the installation and
> > the machine itself would very probably run very slow, because of lack of
> > memory. Luckily, hard disk space was less of a problem.
> >
> > But then, to my surprise, the installation was all done in 45 minutes -
> > and imagine my even bigger surprise when I found that KDE was working just
> > fine - and that even OpenOffice took perhaps 15 seconds to start, and then
> > worked just as snappy as ever. I called up the hardware list, and double
> > checked that yes, indeed, there was only 128MB of RAM in this machine. But
> > it works just fine! OK, things get quickly bogged down with e.g. OO.o,
> > Mozilla, and Kaffeine running at the same time - but if you refrain from
> > carelessly starting several concurrent applications, the machine was
> > perhaps not the fastest horse in the race, but certainly workable. After
> > the install, I spent another hour or two fine tuning the configuration,
> > installing some handy bits, and doing a Quick Tour to get them up to speed.
> >
> > You should have seen the faces of these people: all big eyes and open
> > mouths, for two hours solid ... "What, no driver disks needed?" "Huh, it
> > found and configured the printer all by itself?" "AND the network card?"
> > "Even the old scanner??? That thing has been dead for years, and now it
> > works!" "OpenOffice can use Microsoft .doc by default? So I don't need MS
> > Office?" "What, I can just plug in my MP3 player and drag the songs
> > anywhere I want? Hey mom, look! Even the camera works in one go! We don't
> > have to use that other stupid software any more!" "OK, but there's no MSN
> > on this thing, or is there? There is??? Damn, this is cool!" "But where's
> > the antivirus? Whaddyamean, we don't need it? You must be kidding ... no,
> > you're not?"
> > And so on and so on ... I patiently demonstrated everything and answered
> > all their questions - all but te final one: "But why do people keep
> > paying for Windows when you can get all this for free?" This turned out to
> > be the only question I couldn't answer in a satisfactory manner ...
>
> I run KDE (SUSE 9.3) with just 256 MB or RAM. Most of the time, only three
> quarters of the RAM is being used. No disk space either (I always see the
> meters at the bottom).
Yes, SuSE 9/KDE works satisfactorily on an old 192MB RAM machine and
leaves me with 20-30MB memory while working. But, my home Ubuntu Breezy
sucks up >400MB RAM on a 512 MB RAM machine just after a few minutes of
work; at times, it leaves me with under 30MB and barely any swap used.
Still, that doesnt cause a noticeable difference in the applications
that I work with most often - OO/gedit/FF. Same memory munching with
FC4/5, (X)Ubuntu Drapper (yes, even XUbuntu) on Win+VMWare Server and
the slowdown effect is very evident.
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