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Date:      Tue, 16 Oct 2001 19:17:02 -0400
From:      Matt Penna <mdp1261@rit.edu>
To:        freebsd-doc@freebsd.org
Subject:   FAQ & Install.txt Memory Requirements Incorrect
Message-ID:  <5.1.0.14.0.20011016105839.02de9800@vmspop.rit.edu>

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Dear folks,

I don't know if anyone else has reported this already, but I haven't been 
able to find a previous reference to this problem.

A few weeks ago when I was trying to install 4.4-Release on a system with 
8MB of memory, I encountered very strange errors and couldn't figure out 
what the problem was. Several people on -questions pointed out that 8MB was 
not enough to install, and then we discovered that the reason for my 
confusion was the install.txt file incorrectly stated it only needed 5MB 
for install and 4MB to run, as does the FAQ. I had never installed FreeBSD 
on a machine with so little memory, so I hadn't encountered the problem before.

I looked through the various releases and it seems the INSTALL.TXT for 
4.1.1, 4.2, and 4.4 all state that only 5MB is needed to install. 4.3's 
install.txt seems fine, stating the need for "at least 16 megs of RAM to 
use the installer and 4-8 megs of RAM to run (with a pared-down kernel)."

I was told in a couple of responses from -questions that the requirement 
for install has been >8MB since 4.0-Release, so I'm assuming the 
install.txt files for 4.1.1, 4.2, and 4.4, as well as the install.htm for 
4.4 (and possibly others) are all incorrect.

Ironically, 4.3 did successfully install on the machine with only 8MB, so 
I'm assuming the 16MB requirement provides a comfort zone that will 
guarantee a successful install on virtually any system.

I would submit a fix if I knew at what points and to what amounts of memory 
the minimum requirements were changed. Can anyone suggest how I should 
proceed with this, assuming no one else has noticed it yet?

         Matt

--
Matt Penna        soba@usagiyojimbo.com        mdp1261@rit.edu
ICQ: 399825                                     S0ba on AOLIM
         "The trouble with computers, of course, is
         that they're very sophisticated idiots." -Dr. Who


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