Confirmed: 5.3 installation do not work with 16 MB RAM

[Ramiro Aceves]

Hello FreeBSD friends.

In previous post I told you that I was unable to install FreeBSD 5.3 in 
an old Pentium 100 MHz and 16 MB RAM, with the three floppies (FreeBSD 
4.10 installs well). After the daemon screen, the system rebooted just 
before loading the kernel. That strange behaviour made me try everything 
at the boot loader prompt along several weeks, without success. In the 
floppies directory of the 5.3 installation CDROM states that FreeBSD can 
be installed with at least 8MB RAM:

************************
1.2 Hardware Requirements

    FreeBSD for the i386 requires a 486 or better processor to install 
and run(although FreeBSD can run on 386 processors with a custom kernel) 
and at least 8 megs of RAM to install and 7 megs to run.
***************************

I read on the internet that some people could not install FreeBSD 5.3 in 
16 MB, needing as much as 24 MB to success. I think I have confirmed 
that. A couple of days before, I received from a friend another "fast 
machine" ;-), it was a pentium 75 MHz with 32 MB RAM. I tried to remove 
the memory bank from the pentium75 to the pentium100, but this kind of 
memory did not work on the later one.( it did not like EDO RAM). :-(

So I installed FreeBSD 5.3 on the Pentium 75 machine flawlessly, 
everything went fine. Then I removed two 8MB banks, so that the machine 
was 16 MB RAM. I tried the install floppies, and YES!!!, it rebooted 
before the kernel load.

So FreeBSD can not be  installed with floppies and 16 MB RAM. I needs 
more. How much? I do not know, 32MB work here, but I can not test 24 MB.

I think the files on the manuals should be corrected to avoid this kind 
of issues.

Whell, that is  the story, although I have not been able to get Xorg 
work on this machine, but you will know that in the next post to the list.

Thanks
Ramiro Aceves