Results tagged “Distrowatch” from CLICK

In this week's Distrowatch, I read about a new, small Linux distribution called SliTaz GNU/Linux that packs itself into 25 MB of space, loads and runs quickly -- and entirely into memory with 128 MB of RAM -- and can even run with 16 MB of RAM. Sounds a lot like Damn Small Linux and Puppy, but there's always room for one more project that runs like the proverbial wind on new hardware (SliTaz features a modern 2.6.24 kernel) and keeps the old hardware I use working as well as it can.

From Distrowatch:

So what have the SliTaz developers managed to fit into 25 MB? A lot more than one would expect. The system boots into the JWM window manager with four virtual desktops and a Xfce-like toolbar at the top. It is based on the latest Linux kernel (2.6.24), with glibc 2.3.6, GTK+ libraries and X.Org 7.2. It includes hardware auto-detection modules for network and audio cards, and sets up X with a VESA driver (several screen resolution choices are available during the initial configuration step). Among applications there is the latest Firefox, Ghost In The Mail (email client), gFTP, Transmission (BitTorrent client), mtPaint (image editor), GPicView (image viewer), AlsaPlayer, Asunder (CD ripping tool), Geany (a light-weight IDE) and other small applications. Also included are a CD burning tool and a PDF viewer, while web developers will no doubt welcome the addition of the lighttpd web server with support for CGI and PHP.

So even though I'm mired in Ubuntu 8.04 for my upcoming review of the beta version, I'm going to download and burn SliTaz very soon so I can try it for myself.

The next day: One problem. I couldn't get SliTaz 1.0 to boot at all on my VIA C3 Samuel test box, and on the Dell Optiplex GX 520 (Pentium 4), It booted fine, allowed me to choose English as my language, a US keyboard ... but the system wouldn't recognize my Ethernet card, so I couldn't get networking going.

I'll try it in the $15 Laptop (based on a Pentium II MMX and with the Orinoco WaveLAN wireless card), but so far I'm 0 for 2 in the SliTaz game.

The day after that: I tried to run SliTaz on the $0 Laptop -- the Gateway Solo 1450. It booted fine, but I couldn't get past the login screen. Funny -- I didn't have to login on the Dell. But on the Gateway, neither the "hacker" account, nor root, would log me in, even with the supplied passwords.

Hopefully they'll get it right with SliTaz 1.1 (or 2.0), but for now, it's a distro with a lot of promise but not a whole lot of delivery -- at least for me.