Installing Vector on Tosh Tecra 520cdt .tlz failiure

[petebarchetta]

hello all,

trying to install vector on my  tosh tecra 520cdt, i have upgraded the hardware to a heady 160mb ram,40gb HD, DVDRW drive and runs XP
soon to change for the better. i have a donor machine the same,but in more basic spec.98mb ram and 2gb HD. i want to test the idea,before i toast the better machine..... a guniea pig LOL
what is the minimum space required for an install? and the ideal partition settings to make the install work.
i have test installed the vector build with rough guesses at the partitions etc and removed most of the fancy bits to keep the build slim, although the build does not complete and has a failiure on the .tlz files
has anyone experienced this similar problem?
more info to follow

[caitlyn]

With only 99MB or RAM you want Vector Linux Light, not Standard or SOHO.  1.8GB is about the minimal space to install.  With the hibernation partition at ~100MB and ~200MB for swap you have 1.7GB left. That's why it can't finish uncompressing the lzma archive.  You just don't have enough disk space for installation on that box.  You would be better off with a distro that has a smaller footprint.  There was a "Mini" version of Vector Linux that was based on alpha builds of Light but that project was abandoned and is no longer in the repo.  If you really want to try it (warning: alpha code is guaranteed to have bugs) I can post it for you.  A regular released version of Vector Linux simply won't fit on your low spec box.

Your machine with the 40GB HDD will be fine, of course.  You didn't give a processor speed but I'm assuming slow so I'd still recommend Light.  You can't "toast" the machine.  Nothing you do, no matter how messed up the installation, will cause permanent damage.

[petebarchetta]

sounds like a challenge to me.....
its a tecra 520cdt 133mhz i have a CF to IDE convertor i got today along with a 4gb CF card, from good ol' ebay. i intend to  rip the nafff 2gb drive out and go solid state to improve the ol' beast. at least then i can have more headroom.
at least i know its space that is messing it up.
thanks for the reply. will let you know how the CF card fares with HW detection
at least the battery will last longer
would be interested in the mini version to see how it copmpares to DSL, as thats what was on there before

[caitlyn]

The mini version is not comparable to DSL  It takes 1.1GB of space to install.  It's just a slightly smaller build of VL Light. 

DSL and Slitaz are unique. DSL builds on an old 2.4.x kernel and uses old apps.  VL doesn't ever ship backlevel apps that are no longer supported.

[petebarchetta]

my apologies, i was not aware of the  mini version info, hence assuming it is "small" build. a 1.1gb foot print would be god to try...at least it would fit on the HD, sling it over and i'll give it a whirl
still a gig build would have plenty more goodies than DSL 
buggy builds are good, it makes fixing them more meaningful LOL

[petebarchetta]

thanks for the reply. will let you know how the CF card fares with HW detection
at least the battery will last longer

both the machines are trusty tecra 520 cdt's running 133mhz, one is an old works box, and the other is my own (hence my own machine being heavily modified)
Spec is as Follows:
Toshiba Tecra520cdt #1
98mb ram@133mhz CPU 2Gb HD, version 6.9 Bios, CDrom (Linux test box, soon to be solid state 4Gb CF to IDE HD)
Toshiba Tecra520cdt #2
160mb ram@133mhz CPU 40gb HD, version 6.9 Bios, DVDRW (XP SP2)


EDIT:  it is vector Light that i am having the issues with (just checked my burned CD), so maybe the mini is the way to go if i stay with the normal HD. will attempt a reburn to see if that clears the errors

[petebarchetta]

caitlyn,

can you post the mini version up, i'll try that in my 2gb HD, otherwise i'll look at low level format the 8gb CF and try to partition it.
also is there a CF version of Vector in the pipeline?
or a way of minimising the writes to the CF card as they only have a finite amount of writes per sector.

thanks

[caitlyn]

Mini is no longer anywhere to be found on the VL server, sorry.  I did look.

There is a new project (not sure if it is VL based or just Slackware based at this point) called Linux Ultralight that should meet your needs (i.e.: very light apps, <1GB footprint) but they haven't posted a public alpha yet.  I expect it will appear next month.

[nightflier]

If you de-select the "dev" "office" "lxde" and all the other optional packages, VL 5.9 Light will use about a gig and a half. Doesn't leave you with a lot of functionality or room to maneuver, but could be educational.

As far as a specific CF version, nothing like that for now. However, I run my desktop machine off of a CF card, and there are some things you can do to minimize the amount of writes, check out this thread: http://forum.vectorlinux.com/index.php?topic=4564.0

You may want to try this unofficial version optimized for really old computers:
http://cincinnatix.com/vectorlinux/nightflier/VL5.9.1-Light.iso
md5sum:  d244c8a0d3f76f0812099c9e444e4cb3

[uelsk8s]

the mini is hiding here: http://vectorlinux.osuosl.org/Uelsk8s/iso-test/VL5.9-Mini-A1.iso

[caitlyn]

I thought I looked in your directory   Oh well... Thanks, Uel.

Once you're officially back I'll get in touch with you privately about learning what I need to do to make a fresh, new mini based on 6.0.

[petebarchetta]

thanks all,

will give these a go and see what happens, this forum rocks!! lovely helpful people here

[petebarchetta]

uel,

do you have a checksum for the mini version, i get a invalid block size when i try to burn this. it says circa 200mb, but the file is coming in at 182mb

thanks

[uelsk8s]

not sure which you grabbed so here they both are:

2d7bef6f5c07967df10800ae411cbc36  VL5.9-Mini-A1.iso

8e753b4af313d0c8d8288b250c70ec33  VL5.9-Mini-A1.1.iso

[petebarchetta]

i take it these are pure Iso's and not bootable versions as per 5.9 that i got the .TLZ error on? So i would nest these on the drive and then run a copy in the CDROm drive so that the machine picks it up.

just querying as i get invalid disk and wanted to rule this out and not put it down to a buggy disk


as i'm trying it on a small drive i am running on a low ceiling and want to keep clear of bump your head errors