36 replies to this topic

[Shafayat]

Hello there, can you give me link to any Operating system (no matter Linux or not) that has GUI but really small (e.g. near 2mb). And I have tried MinuteOS. Something else than that, please.

[coolcat50]

Is this even possible?? That's not that much data and would probably very primitive. I do not think it is possible to have a GUI and be 2MB at the same time.

[spyzo101]

As coolcat50 said you can't have an OS with GUI under 2mb.

Here is a excellent Linux-based OS:


Damn Small Linux


DSL is a very versatile 50MB mini desktop oriented Linux distribution.

A bit over your limit but it is worth it!

Edited by spyzo101, 08 January 2008 - 12:35 PM.

[SamiFX]

Try search for Windows 3.11, It's only 15MB.

[ironchicken]

Try Minix, visit their official site here

Supposedly, it contains only 4000 lines of code, and can run off a 386 processor with only 8 MB of RAM.

You can download it as a live CD, but it is also possible to install it onto a Hard Disk.

[paolocastro]

Shafayat, on Jan 4 2008, 01:18 AM, said:

Hello there, can you give me link to any Operating system (no matter Linux or not) that has GUI but really small (e.g. near 2mb). And I have tried MinuteOS. Something else than that, please.

i suppose that by MinuteOS you actually mean MenuetOS, which is an operating system written entirely in assembly and fits on a single floppy.

[iGuest]

There are lots of open source OSes with GUIs,
Some GUIs are programmed directly into the kernel and are less than 1mb in total, I recommend you try Aros which is less than 15mb of size and features a very nice graphical userinterface, http://aros.Sourcefo...es/screenshots/ .

[EngrJayze]

haha.. maybe you should try primitive version of windows.. but why do you want to have an os that is under 2mb?.. you'll get nothing from it right?

[iGuest]

QNX4 demodisk
Smallest Os With Gui

Replying to Shafayat

Try the qnx4 1.44mb demo disk, it even has a webserver and webbrowser:
Http://web.Archive.O...x.Com/demodisk/

[bluedragon]

Shafayat, on Jan 4 2008, 10:48 AM, said:

Hello there, can you give me link to any Operating system (no matter Linux or not) that has GUI but really small (e.g. near 2mb). And I have tried MinuteOS. Something else than that, please.

Hi,
why do you need this anyways ? Most of the processors (even Celerons) can handle Linux distros properly so why go for a stripped down version. As some ppl have suggested, you might wanna go for DSL or something like that.
You may also want to check Slax.org. Slax is a good option and pretty soon they'll be adding a customisation page to their site where you'll be able to get a complete customized Linux for your needs.
And slax can also run off a pen drive

And a 2 MB linux distro is not possible since the kernel itself takes up around 20-25 MB.

I dont think its possible to cramp up a gui along with some good features in 2 mb.

[iAmDaveMyers]

Hello All.

This really depends on what you want to do with the OS?

If you are actually looking for a windowing system that only uses minimal services that is different.

spyzo101 has allready mentioned DamnSmallLinux, this is the one that immediately sprang to my mind.

However there are a number of Linux distro's that are equally small, but run from the command line - which may not be what you are looking for.

If you are looking for something to run on an "old" system then DamnSmallLinux should work a treat, if however you have a reasonable level of computing power then most of the Linux distros (my personal experience would suggest Ubuntu, SuSe, Debian) have a "small" version that you can download for a server (only has minimal system overhead, which is probably what you want).

If you then want to have a nice GUI on the top then there are numerous ones available to Linux. The most commun GUI are KDE and Gnome (neither of which are particularly small), but there are a huge number of others available.

The one that I use on my server (for those occasions I log onto it) is XVWM, is uses about half the amount of system resources compared to the likes of Gnome or KDE.

The thing to remember with a small GUI is that you are going to "miss out" on various things, and having a small underlying OS could make your computing experience rather.... how do I put this.... painful!

As I said at the begining what are you planing on using the computer for?

Also do you really mean 2mb, or should that have read 2gb?

I know of people putting a full working linux distrobution onto a USB key - that could be your answer if you want something that won't use up services on the terminal you are using or want to "take" your whole system with you.

Essentialy there is no reason why you couldn't put a Linux version onto an external HDD and then plug into something like the Asus Eee - in fact thinking about it that would probably not be a bad idea!

Give us an idea of the system that you are planing on running and what you want to do, and we should be able to give other suggestions.

Dave

[iGuest]

Know Your HistorySmallest Os With Gui

Does no one remember the original Macintosh frm 1984? It has 128 kilobytes of memory, and booted a GUI OS off a single floppy.Within a year or two, a GUI OS called GEOS was available for the unenhanced Commodore 64 (64 kilobytes; 8-bit CPU). And here I see people pointing to a 15 meg OS as an example of economy.

-reply by are.J.Bowman

[sakmac]

2mb, no way would you be able to get an os with gui that small. That would probably just be enough to hold all the lines of code.

Like the person somewhere above me, 50 mb is morelikely as you can actually have all the code and also have some pictures like icons. 2mb? Where did you get that figure btw?

[iGuest]

Replying to ShafayatThe answer is: Basic linuxAlinux distro that fits on two floppyes, has a simple GUI (enter it withstartx) and a web browser, and requires less than 16M of ramYou can download it at:Http://www.Ibiblio.Org/pub/linux/distributions/baslinux

angros47

[iGuest]

Windows 98se can be taken down to 50mb with litePC.Com,or much further if you study the work of Richard L James at www.Wimborne.Org, now only an archive copy is available here:

http://web.Archive.O...ws_on_a_floppy/

for systems this small only safe mode is available, without the registry either... Worth a look though,

best of luck,

M

[iGuest]

It is very possible, as a matter of fact 2mb is alot of space when you just need barebones functionality (usb, cdrom, tcp/ip, web browser, ftp, text/hex editor, file browser)

I made a fully compiled GUI in QB4.5 that uses a slimmed down MS-DOS. The GUI is only 100 Kb compiled and I've added some primitive hardware support for usb and Gigabit Ethernet and draws graphics directly by poking directly to main video memory. It also never uses more than 4 megabytes of ram unless dealing with large graphics in excess of the screen resolution.

The whole package fits on one floppy. 640x480x256, 80386DX or better, 4Mb of ram or more

-reply by That GuyKeywords: smallest gui os

[iGuest]

It is very possible, as a matter of fact 2mb is alot of space when you just need barebones functionality (usb, cdrom, tcp/ip, web browser, ftp, text/hex editor, file browser)

I made a fully compiled GUI in QB4.5 that uses a slimmed down MS-DOS. The GUI is only 100 Kb compiled and I've added some primitive hardware support for usb and Gigabit Ethernet and draws graphics directly by poking directly to main video memory. It also never uses more than 4 megabytes of ram unless dealing with large graphics in excess of the screen resolution.

The whole package fits on one floppy. 640x480x256, 80386DX or better, 4Mb of ram or more

-reply by That GuyKeywords: smallest gui os

[iGuest]

Smallest OS w/GUISmallest Os With Gui

If you aren't worried about (very) limited functionality, try to extract the Win95 preinstallation environment.  I had it on a bootable floppy, with most of the files compressed on the floppy, then decompressed to a Ramdrive and run from there.  The GUI is basically called "X" by Microsoft, is strictly 16 bit, and you have to exit to DOS to run any DOS apps.  Will run 16-bit Windows apps OK.  I may take another run at it as a USB bootable OS...

-reply by VSinger

[iGuest]

GUI 2mb????Smallest Os With Gui

I too have been searching  for a super small  Gui of Linux.. Reason: I would like to Port it over to the Playstation one. And also run it on a pc with 64mb of ram and a 1gb hard drive... Any ideas??? if you find one email me... So far damnsmalllinux seems pretty nice! but I need it slimmed down further... Try for the Http://www.Ibiblio.Org/pub/linux/distributions/baslinux linux. Looks nice.

-reply by corey

[FruitRocks]

do you mean under 2 gigabytes? because that's not possible even if you were to find one, it wouldn't support any current program unless it is some new cloud-computing OS.

For open-source, my favorite ones are:

Fedora

Ubuntu 9.10 (by FAR the best one)

Damn Small Linux


and yes, good old Windows 3.11
which is exactly 5.47 megabytes according to MSDN Dev Page
by the way, somebody enlighten me on what 16-bit is...

[iGuest]

yeah, I have a netbook, and want some to boot b4 the actual OS in a few seconds, just to browse the web, and with flash to use youtube. Can anyone make any suggestions?

-question by jmans25

[ahmed_mmahmoud]

it's a kind of crazy (execuse me) to use such an OS
you will get nothing from such 2 MB OS except copy delete files and write *.txt files only

so why you didn't use some programs like NC (it can works with mouse and menus)
note that you have to run mouse.com file as a driver

[Zagubadu·]

Why would you ever need an OS that small? Anyways I do not think its possible not with that size requirement. I think the smallest I've heard of is like sixty megabytes or something around that. I think its Linux based. If you some how manage to find an OS thats two mb it'll probably run like DOS or something like that.

[iGuest]

Small Operating System for an Old Machine with 4MB RAMSmallest Os With Gui

One problem that no-one seems to be addressing is that of RAM & disc capacity.

I have a Sanyo MBC-19NC9 [CPU: Intel 486SXLP/25MHz/4MB RAM; 81.91MB hard drive; ?bit; 640x480 panel; chips 457VGA BI/OS, no OS installed], & would like to use it for experimentation/development. I'm thinking in terms of super-light.

While there are several minute OSs out there: MenuetOS/Kolibri, Visopsys, Dexos, even a 1.44MB bootable version of Plan9 from Bell Laboratories (these are the ones I've tried) most of them require 32MB of RAM to run. As a result, I just get a 'loop-out' when I try to run such an OS.

Are there any OSs out there that need no more than 4MB RAM to operate?-reply by VX37.285Gamma