On Tue, 12 Nov 2002, Jonathan Towne wrote:

> as noted in the subject, I need a stripped-down kernel compiled to get
> my vax working, it only has 4meg of RAM, and this seems to pose a
> problem, as I can't even get a netboot-install running.

It took me a little while, but here's a rather slim version of the
NetBSD/vax 1.5.3 kernel.  This should run (serial console only) on the
MicroVAX 3100 10|20|10e|20e, the VAXstation 3100 30|40|38|48, the
VAXserver 3100, the VT1300, and the MicroVAX 2000 and VAXstation 2000.

   http://www.vax.org/NetBSD/1.5.3/TINY_KA41             (config file)
   http://www.vax.org/NetBSD/1.5.3/netbsd.TINY_KA41.gz   (kernel)

I've tested it on my 16MB MicroVAX 3100, with the following results:

   Nov 28 07:39:54 radiant /netbsd: total memory = 16264 KB
   Nov 28 07:39:54 radiant /netbsd: avail memory = 12828 KB
   Nov 28 07:39:55 radiant /netbsd: using 228 buffers containing 912 KB
    of memory

If my math is right, that's 3436KB used by the kernel, leaving 660KB
available for a 4096KB system.  The 912KB of buffers being used by the
kernel will be fewer with your 4MB vs. my 16MB system; I'd expect you'll
get something a lot closer to 1MB of available memory with the TINY_KA41
kernel.

Be sure to configure some swap :-)

-brian.