Carl Shapiro writes:
> I have been trying to install NetBSD 1.3_BETA on several machines
> which have only 4 megabytes of RAM with little success.  Whether I am
> using the boot.fs or boot-small.fs, sysinst "hangs" when preparing to
> create a disklabel, or shortly there after.  I also can not seem to do
> the install by hand as tar will hang before it is finished extracting
> base.tgz, and MAKEDEV can never seem to finish without hanging either.

My suggestion:

put a "swapctl" binary onto a floppy. Prepare and label the disk etc.
load the swapctl binary onto the hard drive, turn on swapping on your
new swap partition. At this point, you will probably be okay and can
continue the install.

Perry

> On occasion, if I let the machine sit for 25 -> 30 minutes after
> something has decided to hang, things may begin to move again, however
> this very seldomly works.  The machines I have been experimenting with
> are AST made 386 and 486 "Premium" models, a Unisys made laptop
> (i486), and various no-name i386 and i486 clones.  Is this a known
> problem?  Has anyone else experienced similar problems?
> 
> 
> 
> Carl
>