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Re:The Old Computer Challenge by Nursie on Friday July 09, 2021 @06:14AM (#27782188)
Could you run Linux on a 286?

Back in the day I remember there being a project called “elks”, the embedabble Linux kernel, which attempted to achieve that, but it wasn’t a ‘full’ Linux IIRC.

(Edit - looks like ELKS is still with us, primarily aimed at 8086 - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embeddable_Linux_Kernel_Subs... )

Re:The Old Computer Challenge by zh3 on Friday July 09, 2021 @06:39AM (#27782301)
386 was the first x86 linux would run on (because the 286 memory management was...interesting). We did plenty of custom systems on linux 0.99/1.01, typically with 386/16's and 4Mb RAM (seeing off quite a few SCO-based setups in the process).
Re:The Old Computer Challenge by grishka on Friday July 09, 2021 @06:47AM (#27782347)
Doesn't Linux require an MMU for virtual memory, which the 286 doesn't have iirc?