DHCP server installation on 8MB a sub-notebook PC
What's good if you use a notebook PC as a server.
- Silent : Usually Notebook PC does not have a fan.
- Saving energy : Notebook PCs are equipped such as APM to save energy.
- Battery powered. No need to buy a UPS.
Pamlico is a sub-notebook PC with 8MB memory, 120MB HDD and i486SX-26MHz MPU.
Sometimes, I take my Libretto70 or Gateway2000 Liberty to my office. I had to change IP address when I took them
there. At the company, we have a DHCP server. If I have one in my house, I don't have to setup IP address every
time I take them to the office.
(Good old time!)
I downloaded dhcpd from ISC.
- I usually use NFS mounted CD-ROM to install Linux in a NotebookPC. Pamlico has a FDD with a PCMCIA interface. And when this card is inserted in slot 0, slot 1 is disabled. 120MB is not enough to make a DOS partition. So I gave up to install from DOS partition. I thought once I installed diskset A and N from FDs, I could mount NFS and install other disksets. But this was wrong. I had to install AP, D, K from FDs too.
- When memory is 8MB, how much swap partition is enough ? I started from 8MB. But I found that to make a new kernel, you need at least 30MB. I received 'SWAP exhausted' message.
- I tried to minimize the new kernel. IP:Allow large windows (not recommended if <16MB of memory) should be answered N.
- I made a new kernel and mounted CD-ROM. But a strange thing happened. When I entered 'ls' command, came up files are limited max. 7, and the rest were ignored.
- I though this was a TCP/IP related problem and checked 'make config' and modified /etc/rc.d files. Two weeks later, Another idea was flashed. I noticed this might be a PCMCIA related problem. I changed Ethernet card from Accton to 3Com. But nothing had changed. After that, when I read PCMCIA-HOWTO, I felt this was a 'timing' problem. So, I added "cmd_time=16" after PCIC_OPTS= in rc.pcmcia. Even though this value is showed as an example for Gateway2000 Liberty, this solved the problem. Now, NFS, ftp and other network-related things are working fine. (My Liberty works fine without this line.)
- Linux never sleeps, but ...... Notebook PC sleeps and is slow to wake up. When DHCP client calls the server, it takes a little while to answer and the client gives up to search a server. Now, I don't allow Pamlico to sleep.
June 1998