A ``reasonable Internet connection'' is surely a subjective thing.

As for the type of connection supported, in a sense the question is
meaningless.  The Internet uses TCP/IP and that's in even the basic
INSTALL kernel.  However, there is a slightly more subtle point: Last I
saw, PPP is *not* included in the INSTALL system (but SLIP is included).
Presumably this also means that when PPPoE is part of a release version of
NetBSD, it (like PPP) will be stripped from the INSTALL kernels.

However, if you have an ethernet card in your computer, and the INSTALL
kernel can use it, and if you have another machine able to act as a
gateway, that should be great.


There's no need for a scripted FTP.  Just use the standard FTP command,
``mget'' (make sure to turn prompting off).  (In case you aren't aware:
``mget'' is available in the FTP client; it stands for ``multiple get'', I
believe, and works very much like the ``get'' command, save that you can
use it to get multiple files with a single command.)


If you're going to download and test anything before worrying about the
rest, download the boot-floppy image and see if it boots and looks happy.
(Note that I think that the largest floppy image you will probably be able
to use is 1.44MB on an i386 PC.  But the CD's use a 2.88MB (I think) boot
image.  So if the floppy doesn't support your hardware satisfactorily, I'm
not sure that that proves that you couldn't install it from CD.)

Really, you can probably get a bootable CD for US $5 (roughly) from some
distributor.  You can probably get a friend to burn a CD for you for the
cost of a CD-R, if you know anyone with a CD-R/CD-RW drive.


Lastly, don't forget entirely about the big advantage of a CD: You can
re-install NetBSD in a few minutes from CD.  Over a dial-up Internet link,
re-installing via FTP will probably take something like a day.  (Instead
of burning a CD, you might keep the files on a DOS or GNU/LINUX partition,
or on a seperate computer.  Where you keep them isn't so important, but
it's nice to have them *somewhere* that you can get quick access to them.)


  ``I probably don't know what I'm talking about.'' --rauch@math.rice.edu