(Solved) Question about Vector's package manager,....

[nitehawk]

I'm still a fairly new linux "newbie",...and I tried Vector Linux a few months ago.   I really liked it (a LOT!).  I'm happy with Puppy Linux,..(always will use Puppy)......but I also want something as my "main" OS (besides over-bloated Ubuntu).  So I've been considering Zenwalk,...but really would prefer Vector.

My problem?   Well,....when I was using Vector,...I had a hard time with the downloading software thing.  Think it used Slapt-Get,...and was just horribly slow on the old PIII I had.  I was trying to download Wine,....but after downloading,...it went on "building" wine for over 3 hours (until I just gave up and stopped it).  And when I posted a question on this forum about the inordinate amount of time involved,....I was told it was because my computer was perhaps too old.  (But Vector Linux is FOR older computers,...right?)  {PIII -- 1Ghz -- 512ram -- 160G HD}

I was just on the Ubuntu forum,...and they said that Slapt-Get shouldn't have taken that long ....that maybe I had gotten a slow connection,  or a "bad" mirror,..or something (?)

If that's true,...that downloading packages shouldn't take forever,...then I certainly would prefer to use Vector!!!
Can anyone give any info about using the package manager in Vector with an older PIII (on dial-up,...I must add)?
Vector is a very nice distro!  For some reason I would prefer it over Zenwalk,....(maybe that's just me)....

[caitlyn]

On dial-up downloading will always be painfully slow in Vector Linux or any other distro.  No way around that.  The specs of your computer are more than adequate, BTW.

slapt-get and gslapt, IME, are not slower than any other package management system I've tried.  Zenwalk (netpkg) or Ubuntu (aptitude, synaptic) are definitely not faster than gslapt or slapt-get.  There are multiple mirrors for a reason, of course.  If one is slow or having problems you can use another  

[nitehawk]

Thanks for the reply,...
yes,...downloading anything with dialup can be a frustrating experience in itself!!!!  I really want to get Ubuntu off my main partition (it's nice,...apt-get is great,...but too big for my system).   I'd really like to give Vector another shot (really did like it).  I've been reading very good reviews about it over the net.....
The whole concept behind Vector seems to suit me,....(the keeping things simple and light,...the Slackware base,..etc. etc.).
So okay,...here goes.  If the package manager thing works better this time,.....Vector is staying on my hard drive!  I certainly have no complaints at all with anything else,..(oh! Except if I remember,...for some reason, I was only able to use my dialup in the Chestnut Dialer,..if I logged on as "root"),............but it worked, anyhow.

[GrannyGeek]

If you experienced slowness before, I don't think it's your computer to blame. More likely, it was dialup. Some of the packages are quite large and they may be pulling down dependencies, too.

The computer I use for hours every day is a 1.3 GHz Celeron Tualatin with a gig of RAM. A 1.3 GHz Celeron probably performs about the same as a 1 GHz PIII. (The L2 cache in a Tualatin is twice as large as the L2 cache in a regular Celeron but not as large as a PIII's.) I doubt my extra 512 megs of RAM would make GSlapt or Slapt-get faster. I've never experienced slowness with downloading and installing packages--but I have a broadband connection. I'd hate to think of installing something huge like OpenOffice on a dialup connection.

caitlyn's suggestion to try different mirrors is excellent. I'm sure they're not created equal when it comes to speed.
--GrannyGeek

[nitehawk]

Thanks for that input....
but I happened to also remember (gee, it's been awhile!)..but I was running my old 500mhz machine then.  So of COURSE that probably was a lot to blame!!!!!

Anyhow,...I still have the "can't dial out with Chestnut Dialer" problem that I had before.    A nice fellow of the forum, here,..(called "over there")  told me  (way back then)...to go in terminal and type in something (something to give myself "root" priviledges when using Chestnut).....but now I forgot what that command WAS!!!!   (eeek).

"Over There",....are you there?  I see you in some other posts,....I need your help here.  (Maybe I can search the archives).
Just got my new install of Vector on this better computer this morning,...now if I can just dial out with the Chestnut Dialer,...I'll see what it can do!  (Sure is an attractive little distro, isn't it?)  Goes a looooooooooooooooot faster than that  "Big Brown Distro"!

[bigpaws]

Try this:

http://linuxgazette.net/155/misc/lg/vector_linux_how_to_question.html

Bigpaws

[nitehawk]

Thanks, bigpaws!
And I just now found my original thread just by using the forum's "search" button.   So that is solved.