1996 IBM ThinkPad 365ED x 2026 Linux kernel 7.0.0!
Posted by SharktasticA@reddit | retrobattlestations | View on Reddit | 17 comments
On day one of its release, I updated SHORK 486 (my fledgling Linux distro for 486/P5 PCs) with kernel 7.0! Here it is running on my IBM ThinkPad 365ED with Cyrix 5x86 and 24MB RAM! To be honest, there was no real need for me to do this kernel update, just to say that it can still be done, and there was no performance drawback! If you're not aware, future kernel 7.1 will drop support for 486s (and maybe x87 emulation?), so this is basically the last time one can do such an update, at least with a mainline kernel.
There is always the possibility of 486-specific kernel fork. I had thought about it, but I want to learn more about kernel development in the meantime before 7.1 lands. Though it seems there is at least one effort to get on this already!
Merlin80@reddit
Insane 😆on that low amount of ram
SharktasticA@reddit (OP)
It can go lower still, currently as low as 7MB!
jhaluska@reddit
Something about new software running on the hardware keeps it feeling alive to me.
SharktasticA@reddit (OP)
Absolutely!
royalhouseofwindsor@reddit
The industrial design on that thing is so damn good.
tehn00bi@reddit
Did you cross post on r/thinkpad?
Peetz0r@reddit
Ooooh this might actually run on my Compaq LTE Elite 486 laptop with only 12 MB of memory, interesting! I will have to try that rather soon :)
frenchretronerd@reddit
Wonderful combo of PC and OS ! This laptop looks awesome. Damn the IBM ThinkPads were quite something.
bassemann87@reddit
Thats a beauty!
UncleSlacky@reddit
Have you looked at AOSC Retro? It's about the only (other) actively developed distro for 486 and up.
Extr4Sp1cy@reddit
This is just beautiful! Thank you for sharing!
Tall-Introduction414@reddit
Wow! The first time I saw Linux on a laptop was a 100mhz pentium thinkpad running Slackware (linux 2.x kernel), back in the 90s. It's amazing to see kernel 7 running on such vintage hardware.
Really cool machine
SharktasticA@reddit (OP)
Indeed, thank you! It is a really lovely ThinkPad. Even putting how it looks aside, its Model M6-1 keyboard is unparalleled for a laptop, IMO.
jampola@reddit
I’ve seen this pop up in so many places, great work and awesome to see you’re looking into forking before 486 support is dropped.
First thing I’d suggest is doing just that, fork the master branch onto your repo, sync the forks up until support is dropped. Between now and then, take a look at any diffs of stuff making its way into master; you’d be surprised how little dev you’d actually have to do, instead you’d be simply patching/cherry-picking commits for anything you really want to be included in the fork.
SharktasticA@reddit (OP)
Thank you! I hope to hold on to 486 in the kernel for as long as possible! 😅
That definitely sounds like a good way to get started, and I shall do so soon. I'm already starting to get some taste of looking over the kernel's code though - 7.0.0 actually brought a bug in its e820/memory map code, where if a BIOS doesn't give a complete/proper e820 map, it wasn't falling back to other checks. I originally patched it by porting most of SHORK 486's previous kernel (6.14.11)'s e820-related code to 7.0.0, but then David Gow (the person who I linked to in my post description) found the precise error and I simplified the patch. Here's was the issue if you're curious.
KasanesTetos@reddit
Now run an X server.
SharktasticA@reddit (OP)
It has an option to include a GUI (TinyX + TWM), just I haven't got a framebuffer device working and available for it on 365ED yet. Here is what it looks like (second photo) on someone's 380ED with MMX though. I consider that "experimental" at the moment though, I haven't worked on it a whole lot and terminal-based features are my priority at the moment. When you do have a framebuffer though, it works if not a little slow and barebones? You'd want a high-speed 486/Cyrix 5x86 like this for it for sure; 486SX and original DX are very slow running it. There may be optimisations or some 'creative' work I can do to help, just haven't got there yet!