I recently was given an old HP Pavilion 6465 by someone who didn’t want it anymore.
It has a 433 Mhz Celeron processor and 128 Mb RAM.
After some tinkering I got it running Puppy Linux fairly smoothly except for the web browser (Firefox 3.6). I took me an hour this morning to log into my Yahoo! email account.
I bought a 533 Mhz Celeron for a few bucks from a computer guy that should be compatible. It has the same pin grid array (370) and the same FSB clock speed and same voltages, so I’m confident it will be compatible.
My main question is with the RAM. According to HP’s website for this desktop the maximum amount of RAM is 256 Mb (2x 128). Also according to Crucial.com only 256 Mb of RAM are installable in this PC, but they are going by manufacturer recommendation.
I noticed Newegg has some cheap prices for PC100/133 RAM right now. What is the chance I will cause damage by installing 2 256 sticks or even 2x512 for a full Gig. Or will there be a BIOS limitation and the system simply won’t recognize anything larger than 128 Mb sticks? Any Guesses?
I have a 4Gb compact flash card from a camera that doesn’t work anymore. I was looking at this compact flash to IDE adapter. I can essentially have a low powered IDE SSD. The HDD currently installed is a 4000 RPM 5.25" form factor Quantum Bigfoot. It is slow. Should I expect a significant performance gain with the SSD? Personally, I think this has a chance to max out the 66Mbps ATA bus. Am I being too hopeful there?
I probably will drop Puppy for a different lightweight Linux distro. As far as I can tell Puppy Linux installs into the RAM runs from there and then uses a 500 Mb partition on the HDD as a swap file which I believe is why it takes so long for a web page to load. Also Puppy doesn’t fully install to the HDD so I either have to create a partition on the HDD and put the ISO there or always have to keep the CD in the tray whenever I want to boot. I don’t want either.
I’m thinking of trying SliTaz Linux as it can be fully installed to the HDD (SSD). Anyone have any experience with this distro? Specifically I want to run Firefox 3.6 is there an easy install path for Firefox on with this distro? Eh, I’ll try it anyway.
Furthermore I’m doing this for fun as much as to get a working low powered PC for light surfing and email. I consider this a hobby & don’t mind spending a little money on it. Assuming the RAM can be upgraded I think I will have a capable PC when the build is completed. Any opinions there?
I’m not interested in going to BestBuy and buying anything off the shelf. Any appeals to do so will be ignored.
Programmer here, with an outdated Computer Technician certificate from a more civilized age.
I’d abide by the manufacturer’s statement. Different motherboards may only be able to address up to a specified RAM size. Adding more would be unlikely to cause damage as long as the modules are inserted properly (e.g. not backwards). I’d recommend buying another 128 and installing it.
Replacing it with 1x 256 M might also work (check documentation).
The Quantum Bigfoot is a low performing hard drive. I’d guess that almost anything else is going to give better performance.
It is possible to install Puppy Linux onto a harddrive, so that it boots from the hard drive, no CD or ISO needed. I was able to do this on an old desktop I have. I thought that was an option somewhere, but it was a bit hard to get it right.
Anecdotally for the memory, at work ten years ago, my computer claimed it only supported 384 MB, but the IT guy upgraded it to 768. He knew somehow that much would work.
because that recommendation is correct. it has the Intel 440ZX chipset, which can only ever use a maximum of 256 MB of RAM. And if you’re really unlucky, that 256 MB will need to be in the form of two double-sided 128 MB DIMMs. If you stick a new single sided 256 MB DIMM in there, you might be surprised to find it’s only detected as 128 MB.
even if it’s compatible, it’ll be hardly any better at running anything resembling modern software.
as I said, the chipset has a hard limit of 256 MB total RAM. Nothing should be damaged if you try to cram in more, but I won’t dare to predict whether the system will boot, or if it does, how much RAM it’ll actually detect.
yes, you’re being way too hopeful. That system is ancient. It’s far too slow for anything approaching a modern OS; furthermore, even if you did get something reasonably recent installed, any typical modern website would bring the poor thing to its knees.
you’re wasting both your time and your money. Drop that stuff in an electronics recycling bin where it belongs.
I used to be a huge fan of playing with what were functionally doorstops, but the limitations just got old after a while. Have fun but don’t put any time or effort into getting this thing running, it’s paleolithic. Seriously, this is the sort of thing people pay other people to take away.
RE using the flash card as an SSD this is not going to work as well as you might imagine. Flash memory is fast on the retrieve but slow on the write. True SSD drives have various built in workarounds for these limitations, a simple flashcard adapter will not.
I keep a few old ones around in the basement for offline file storage/backup. They are kinda interesting to putter around with from time to time if you are into that sort of thing, but that’s about it.
just a point to think about- if you want a “low-power” system, you’re barking up the wrong tree. The 533 MHz PPGA Celeron consumes 28.3 watts. The Intel Atom N450 is a miserable piece of shit, but it’s several times faster than a Celeron 533 and consumes 5.5 watts. The only way that relic you’re fiddling with is “low power” is if we’re talking about capability.
firefox uses about 400meg of ram just to load all my tabs from the previous session, so I think the idea of web surfing, except on perhaps a geological time scale, is completely out of the question with 256M.
Windows creates a file on the disk for virtual memory (basically ram overflow). I don’t know about Linux but I assume every modern OS uses virtual memory. In that case, with too little memory, you’ll be hitting that page file like a rented mule. You got some idea of what that’s like when it took you an hour to check email. Your hard drive must have been chattering like a set of cartoon false teeth.
As to the idea of a poor man’s SSD, don’t waste your money. aside from the fact that your sd card isn’t anywhere near as fast as a true ssd, the number of writes it can handle before it’s toast will be much less than an ssd. The memory cells in those cards aren’t meant for the kinds of writes a hard disk is designed to handle. An HDD can last for many years and the magnetic platers themselves never wear out.
Not only that, even if it does work and you can install the os on it, if you put the page file there too, the amount of activity that alone will see with fry your sd card in record time.
There really is no point to having a machine like this unless you have special software that will only run on something like MS-DOS or Win 95/98. Things like data acquisition software comes to mind. Software that runs certain peripherals too - like old tape backup drives. I have that problem right now. I had to rebuild an old pentium system just to get the data off of some ancient backup tapes.
There are also the people who are into classic games. Some are even fans of the old text-only “games”. Old systems are just what you need in a case like that. You even have situations where the software tries to address the hardware directly.
But for any contemporary use, you really are wasting your time.
Not to pile on or anything, but I’ll agree that it’s not a good investment of either time or money. (And I mean any money). I also enjoy tinkering with older systems, but I’ve passed by better hardware left at the curb years ago.
As an exercise in hardware exploration, and minimal system requirements install, I’d say go ahead, but for anything intended for even casual use you need something completely different.
Thanks for all the replies. I am posting from this machine right now. I pulled a 64 Mb RAM stick from a different computer I use to run FreeDOS for old games.
After having read everyone’s replies last night I honestly didn’t expect a noticeable boost in performance. I have three tabs open in Firefox right now including my Yahoo! mail which opened in less than a minute with the additional RAM.
Since I’ve already spent the whopping $5.00 on the 533 processor I’m going to go ahead and install it. I’ll forgo buying coffee at the convenience store for the next few days to justify it.
This PC is low-power in comparison to my gaming rig which I often use for light surfing and email. I think I will go ahead a buy a 128 meg stick and the compact flash adapter for a total of about $30 invested including the processor. (I’ll be drinking instant coffee for a while).
I have no other use for the CF card anyway and I see the adapter as being one more toy in my collection of PC stuff. If the card fizzles out I have several relatively modern 7200 RPM HDDs collecting dust somewhere. As far as I’m concerned It’s worth a try.
jz78817 Thanks for pointing out that the RAM limitation is due to the hardware thanks for saving me from buying anything more than the 128 stick.
With the faster processor, RAM maxed out and a better HDD I think I’ll have a useful computer. You guys are way too pessimistic.
I’m still something of a novice with Linux, but from my reading and playing around with Puppy the way to do a full install is to make a partition on the HDD with the disk image on it. The file system resides on a separate partition. If you don’t put the disk image on a partition you still need the CD in the tray to boot.
I don’t see the advantage in doing it this way, nor do I want to take the time to configure it. I believe it is due to the developer’s insistence that Puppy is meant to be a portable OS and the “frugal” install (as they call it) is a compromise for those who want to do a full install. Damn Small Linux has the same situation, also it has more limited driver support especially for wireless networking. Hopefully SilTaz Linux will fulfill my needs.
Just chiming in to agree. I keep some older hardware around, but just last year dumped anything under 1 ghz. The only one to survive that cull was an old 600 mhz toughbook cuz that thing won’t die and still runs some useful cnc programs I occasionally still use.
As long as you have fun, that’s the main thing. So I’m not going to harsh your buzz anymore, but I do need to point out that even if your more modern drive uses the older IDE interface, it’s very unlikely that the computer will be able to use more than a fraction of it. Addressability of disc sectors for IDE drives is determined by the bios. I don’t remember what you need to look for though. I think it has something to do with LBA (large block addressing).
So for example if you have a 250Gig drive, there’s an excellent chance that you will pop it in and it will only come up in the bios as 8 or maybe 32G. Wish I could be more help but it’s been such a long time since I’ve dealt with those issues.
I have it installed like any other Linux. No disk image. The instructions here look like what I remember, but I don’t know that I followed those instructions. I remember it took a couple tries to get it installed right. I think you’re correct that is hard because of the developer’s philosophy.
When I boot, grub comes up, with the option to boot Windows or Puppy.
Well I think it’s cool. But I was just checking, and the computer I have Puppy on is a 350MHz Pentium II with 192 MBytes. The Windows it dual boots with is Windows 98. So maybe I’m not the best judge.
I set it up so my three kids could all find a computer if they needed one, but none of them wanted to use it. I guess I should have seen that coming.
(Actually, I’ve still got my 486 sitting in the basement that dual boots Windows 3.1 and OS/2 Warp. I’m a sick man…)
I knew someone would see things my way. As I mentioned earlier I also have a Pentium II that runs FreeDOS mostly for games but I also have a few apps - MS Word 5.5 for one.
I already have a gaming rig that can play Crysis at full settings at 1080p. But, yeah I do want to maximize the performance of this old HP as much as possible. If I can get an extra 100 Mhz clock speed for not much cost - why the hell not? It couldn’t hurt.
