View Full Version : A small OS for a small hard drive?
David Prahl
10-21-2003, 10:35 PM
This is not a life-and-death question. In fact - it's closer to boredom-and-amusement. :lol: But please let me know what you think anyway.
I have an old Toshiba laptop: 100 MHz, thick and heavy, and about a 100 MB hard drive. I'd like to do something with it, since it's just running DOS right now. Does anyone know of any OS that would not take up more than 100 MB and I can get on floppy disks*?
*Yes, only floppies - no CD-ROM. :oops:
Thanks for your help.
JonnoB
10-21-2003, 11:17 PM
Windows 3.1, GEOS, DOS
Janak Parekh
10-21-2003, 11:18 PM
Win95 was available on floppies, if you can get ahold of it, and I'm pretty sure it eats "only" 40-ish MB. But you need at least 8MB RAM for that to be practical.
Jonno, you forgot OS/2... and maybe Linux, although you have to find a fairly light distro. And it's "GeoWorks", not "GEOS". :)
--janak
mscdex
10-21-2003, 11:35 PM
I say go for linux, it's ultra-customizable and you can make it as big or as small as you want. There's plenty that would fit the size requirement you have, you just have to google for some. :)
Tom W.M.
10-27-2003, 12:37 AM
MenuetOS (http://www.menuetos.org/) runs from a floppy.
It's possible to install BeOS (http://www.bebits.com/app/2680) on that hard disk, but I don't know of a way to install it with only floppies. Perhaps you could pull the disk and stick it in your desktop—then you could us the install routine from BeOS Personal Edition to stick it on the disk, though again, I'm not sure that the PE is small enough. In any case, BeOS can be run from a 32 MB CompactFlash card—so we know it's possible.
David Prahl
10-27-2003, 02:01 AM
Arrg! I really want to try MenuetOS, but it's 1.42 MB and a 1.44 MB disk only leaves 1.38 when it's done formatting.
A zipped version is available, but I don't have a ZIP extractor for DOS.
Tom W.M.
10-27-2003, 06:52 AM
Why do you need a zip extractor for DOS? Can't you just image the floppy with rawrite from your desktop, and boot to it in the laptop?
Arrg! I really want to try MenuetOS, but it's 1.42 MB and a 1.44 MB disk only leaves 1.38 when it's done formatting.
A zipped version is available, but I don't have a ZIP extractor for DOS.
Uhm. I'm pretty sure Menuet is distributed as an image, yes? Write the image to the disk, don't format it.
dMores
10-27-2003, 04:32 PM
hmm ... can't you borrow an external cd rom drive?
if a file is larger than 1.38 mb, try to create a self-extracting ZIP file that spans multiple disks.
not sure how that works under windows, but in DOS it was a just annother parameter
David Prahl
10-27-2003, 05:50 PM
The image is 1.40 MB. What's this about "rawrite?
I've tried installing win95 from an external CD+RW. Didn't work correctly.
What do I do once I get the image on the disk? Just run the .img file?
Thanks for your help, everyone!
Janak Parekh
10-27-2003, 05:53 PM
The image is 1.40 MB. What's this about "rawrite?
You can't copy the .IMG file to a disk and expect it to work. The .IMG file is a "container" for the actual contents of the disk, and you need a tool to write it out, bit-by-bit. rawrite (Google for it) is a free tool that does exactly that.
I've tried installing win95 from an external CD+RW. Didn't work correctly.
You'd probably need a boot disk with the CD+RW drivers installed in it.
What do I do once I get the image on the disk? Just run the .img file?
Just boot off the disk.
--janak
mscdex
10-27-2003, 06:46 PM
Rawrite is a windows/dos application that allows you to write the disk .img file to the disk. Think of it as a compressed archive. When you write the .img to the disk using rawrite, all of the necessary files to boot linux from the floppy will be on the disk.
Oliver Mitchell
10-27-2003, 09:26 PM
you could get pkzip from here (http://www.softpile.com/Utilities/Compression/Review_05053_index.html) it's only 203kb and it adds in to dos to handle zip files
You could also try FreeBSD or Linux. See the 4mb laptop HOWTO - http://www.google.com/search?q=4mb%20laptop%20howto
David Prahl
10-28-2003, 03:27 AM
I've been spending some time on this problem. :evil: And it's still a problem!
--Got PKZIP working just fine. Tried doing the .img file, self-extracting the setup.exe file, and manually extracting the setup.exe file - no luck.
--It's never the same error (or problem). Setup.exe copies the .img file to a floppy, but it always errors out. Tried this on a deskop machine and on the ol' Toshiba laptop.
--I have zero experience with installing Linux (:oops:). The 4MB distribution sounds great, but I'm unsure how to install it.
--About the whole external CD-RW thing: I did install the drivers, but win95 setup would freeze about half way through. Don't know why.
SO:
Problems with the ZIP files.
Can't get the image onto the floppy.
Don't know squat about installing Linux.
I'm getting discouraged. I think I'll just give up and leave it at DOS. :roll:
Tom W.M.
10-28-2003, 03:29 AM
If you can't find a working rawrite anywhere, you can download BeOS PE as linked to in my first post. After you run the installer, go to the BeOS folder on the drive you installed it on—you should see a rawrite.exe.
--It's never the same error (or problem). Setup.exe copies the .img file to a floppy, but it always errors out. Tried this on a deskop machine and on the ol' Toshiba laptop.
So use rawwrite (http://uranus.it.swin.edu.au/~jn/linux/rawwrite.htm) then? Also, make sure your floppies are good first. Under windows.. Start > run > command > format A:/FS:FAT/X
--I have zero experience with installing Linux (:oops:). The 4MB distribution sounds great, but I'm unsure how to install it.
That's what the HOWTO files are for ;) The official site is first or second on that google search.
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