Puppy Linux

I was wondering if anyone has ever heard of Puppy Linux. I am downloading it because apparently its the smallest, most compact Linux OS (100MB).

I decided I might as well dual boot it and try it out, since I really want a Linux OS to turn to that doesn't take a while to load up or take up a lot of space (Ubuntu).

I was wondering if anyone heard of it or tried it, if not its worth a look : http://www.puppylinux.org/home

I think its cool because you can just keep the whole OS on a CD-R or USB Key and boot it anywhere and it saves putting it on your hard drive.

I prefer the Ubuntu install CD which can boot to a desktop straight from the disc, but as you say, it takes longer to boot than these lightweight OSs.

I usually stay away from the lightweight distros as I don't like the window managers they come with (IceWM, Enlightenment, etc), but I've no experience with JWM. I'm sure earlier versions of PL didnt have JWM though, I tried so many I can't remember.

Actually, if you're going for small size and speed, then there is Damn Small Linux that is 50mb in size, but it is based off of an older version of the Linux kernel meaning you won't get things like drivers for newer hardware and also its development ceased in late 2008.

http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/

avery1555 said:

I think its cool because you can just keep the whole OS on a CD-R or USB Key and boot it anywhere and it saves putting it on your hard drive.

Ubuntu does this too. The install CD is a live CD.

Yeah I know, but Ubuntu is slow while Puppy loads up in 30 seconds for me.

EDIT : I'm on Puppy Linux right now and it actually detects my wireless adapter and driver off the bat :D. Good so far.

We got Puppy Linux running on a very old laptop at work recently. From what I saw it was pretty nice, and the window manager seemed straight forward with how it was configured. Boot times were surprisingly short for it being a Pentium 2 with 256mb ram, somewhere around 50 seconds I think.

On a side note, Window managers are all about preference and need. I usually prefer Fluxbox or StumpWM.

It boots nice and quick from a live CD on my HP Pavilion N5170 (Pentium 3 600 MHz, 128 MB of RAM), but unfortunately I can't figure out how the hell to install it to the point where it'll boot properly. It somehow always ends up having a kernel panic, or randomly just turning the laptop off.

Meh, just tried it in a VMware machine. Frankly the whole thing seems to have an amateurish feel to it and I'm not particularly impressed.

I'm actually looking for a small distro that I can use to put on a spare USB flash drive that I have lying around (it's always useful to have a Linux install to hand). I was considering Puppy Linux or DSL but at this point I may just do a generic Debian install.

I might actually try this out. I have an old computer that I want set up for my dad's fiance's kids. I put Xubuntu on there, but it is still reeeeeaaaaalllllyy fucking slow. My next option was going to be Gentoo, as I have slight experience with it in the past, but maybe I'll try this out if it is pretty easy.

avery1555 said:

Yeah I know, but Ubuntu is slow while Puppy loads up in 30 seconds for me.

EDIT : I'm on Puppy Linux right now and it actually detects my wireless adapter and driver off the bat :D. Good so far.

Ubuntu's slow? It loads in 30 seconds in my Celeron VAIO through VMWare at work... (i'm not well versed in Linux, frankly, I just use it for poorly ported/unsupported open source projects).

Puppy Linux is a fairly unpolished small distro, and their forum suffers from alot of drama and ridiculous censorship of constructive criticism. The userbase have even made death threats against an O'Reilly author because of her negative comments about it on Distrowatch. Unless you can support everything yourself, I wouldn't recommend using it.

If you want a good lightweight distro, then check out Slitaz, it shits all over DSL and Puppy in both size (29Mb) and features.

It's a bit of a learning curve, but Arch can be as light or heavy as you want. Crunchbang is a lightweight Ubuntu install script which uses Openbox as its' window manager.

Another way to have a light Linux playing Doom is probably to just debootstrap and apt-get install prboom.

Also, considering this hardware is so old it's having trouble booting current Ubuntu, why not just DOS/FreeDOS and run Vanilla? You can also run older Boom, SMMU, Legacy and ZDoom under DOS.

Zaldron said:

Ubuntu's slow? It loads in 30 seconds in my Celeron VAIO through VMWare at work... (i'm not well versed in Linux, frankly, I just use it for poorly ported/unsupported open source projects).

Chances are you are using an ISO to boot from. Booting from an actual CD takes longer.

@Super Jamie

I understand where you are coming from but I really like it. It does what it says it does, and for 100MB I think its great. Also, it has Slackware support and automatically installs programs via PET files.

So far, Puppy is my main Linux platform. Ubuntu is alright but I hate the networking in it and hate that I have to install all my drivers manually as the updates continue on.

What hardware is so old? My PC is brand new.

Puppy Linux was one of the distros I tried when reviving my dad's old laptop. It didn't have drivers for all the hardware. It might eventually, but Win2000 already does, so...

avery1555 said:

What hardware is so old? My PC is brand new.

I hate Ubuntu's nm-applet as well, I disable it on everything except my laptop, where I travel around to various wireless LANs.

What drivers do you have trouble with?

Super Jamie said:

I hate Ubuntu's nm-applet as well, I disable it on everything except my laptop, where I travel around to various wireless LANs.

What drivers do you have trouble with?

My Broadcom wireless adapter Im pretty sure. It doesnt find the drivers for it at all. I tried all the software that was supposed to help recommended on the Ubuntu forums but no one could help me out.

Bucket said:

Puppy Linux was one of the distros I tried when reviving my dad's old laptop. It didn't have drivers for all the hardware. It might eventually, but Win2000 already does, so...

What version were you using? Try 4.2 if you didn't already.

It keeps getting updated constantly since the Linux kernel is growing massively (I heard like 4,500 lines of code are added daily to the kernel) so its best to try the updated Puppy if you haven't already, otherwise I would just use Ubuntu...

avery1555 said:

My Broadcom wireless adapter Im pretty sure. It doesnt find the drivers for it at all. I tried all the software that was supposed to help recommended on the Ubuntu forums but no one could help me out.

Ah yeah, there are beta drivers out for some Broadcom cards, but they're apparently pretty unstable. I ran into the same problem with my previous laptop, I just ended up buying an Intel 3945ABG MiniPCI card off eBay. Less than US$30 and solved all my problems :)

Super Jamie said:

Ah yeah, there are beta drivers out for some Broadcom cards, but they're apparently pretty unstable. I ran into the same problem with my previous laptop, I just ended up buying an Intel 3945ABG MiniPCI card off eBay. Less than US$30 and solved all my problems :)

Well I'm getting a new Laptop in about 2 months so ill see if it works on that one, if not I will, like you said, buy a new card. Thanks but which cards should I be looking for?

This one. If you search for "3945abg" on eBay you'll find heaps of them.

avery1555 said:

It keeps getting updated constantly since the Linux kernel is growing massively (I heard like 4,500 lines of code are added daily to the kernel) so its best to try the updated Puppy if you haven't already, otherwise I would just use Ubuntu...

But Windows 2000.

Bucket said:

But Windows 2000.

In my opinion, Win2000 is very unstable... I have had many problems with repairs and just normal usage back when I had it. I upgraded to XP though so I don't know if anyone/team has stabilized 2000 at Microsoft or if they even still update it.

Though I did have some good times with 2000 back when I had it, not saying its all bad.

Anyone else see it (Win2000) as a sort of Win98/XP hybrid?

Not at all. Win2k is NT4 with USB support, Active Desktop, and DirectX 8. It's similar to 9x in interface only.

I found 2000 to be massively stable, and used it exclusively myself until XP SP2 came out.

avery1555 said:

Anyone else see it (Win2000) as a sort of Win98/XP hybrid?

I see XP as a 2000/98 Hybrid.

Planky said:

Chances are you are using an ISO to boot from. Booting from an actual CD takes longer.

My mistake, I misread the "boot from CD" part.

avery1555 said:

In my opinion, Win2000 is very unstable...

Are you kidding me? Win2k was the only version of Windows I actually liked. I kept using it for a few years after XP came out before switching to Ubuntu 5.04.

exp(x) said:

Are you kidding me? Win2k was the only version of Windows I actually liked. I kept using it for a few years after XP came out before switching to Ubuntu 5.04.

No I'm not kidding you, I've just had very bad experiences with it.

Win2000 is still my primary operating system.

Could anyone recommend a lightweight distro that could run on a Pentium 3 600 MHz laptop with 128 MB of RAM and 8 GB of disk space? I'm having no luck with installing Xubuntu.

You probably won't be able to start the Xubuntu LiveCD, get the alternate install CD and run the text-based installer. It gives you the same OS, just doesn't start the graphical environment as you install.

Beyond Slitaz, Damn Small Linux and Puppy you might also have luck with Vector or Zenwalk. If you know what you're doing, you could install a very cut-down Arch/Slackware/Gentoo, but they're not exactly for beginners.

Truthfully, you're really pushing your luck with 128Mb RAM. I'd use NT4 on a PC like that. Install IE4 then IE6 and you get Active Desktop with QuickLaunch (just installing IE6 doesn't achieve this), and SP6 has limited DirectX support so you can play a few games. Isn't there NTDoom still floating around?

Or, try score an old SODIMM off eBay, 256Mb or even 192Mb RAM will give you more options.

I got Xubuntu running on a similar machine, but it was too goddamn slow. I tried Gentoo but it got hung up during installation for whatever reason.

I'm actually trying out Puppy Linux right now and it is actually quite fast, even just the liveCD version. I'm installing right now so I'll see how good it is in practice.

It's kind of ugly, but it gets the job done.