Install from backpack

[evil_roy]

I got hold of a 486 laptop with 8 meg RAM.
It was running DOS6.2 and WIN3.1.

Got a backpack cdrom (works through serial port) - fired it up with Deb2.2 cd , repartitioned - I want to use only linux - of course when Debian install fired up I lost access to the cd ...so now I got a laptop with no OS at all.

Does anyone know a way to install via a backpack cdrom when there is no OS?

My other option is to grab a stack of floppies and go that way ...or try some minimal install (it has a pcmcia nic) and go for ftp install ...will this latter method involve less floppies.

Any tips/suggestions appreciated.

[ph34r]

Why not install teh base off of floppies - "only" 15 or so required...

[Unruly]

An FTP install would be ideal. It only requires a single disk (I think) and then you just apt-get everything...

Read up on it at http://www.debian.org/

[evil_roy]

16 floppies required for debian base install as follows :

1 rescue
1 root
3 drivers
11 base

(correct me if I'm wrong). I'll read more at debian , however apt is somewhere in the 11 base install floppies. Has anyone tried a root/net then install via ftp ? The NHF is written up for RH. I'll get something sorted out....it's like a lot of things...the time you spend working out how to do something a quicker/easier way is greater than the time spent(in this case) getting hold of a stack of floppies and writing them,swapping them..aarrgh..I'll keep looking.

Thanks

[RoySmith]

is there room enough on the hard drive to copy most of the cd to the hd and then install from there? that assumes you could boot from a floppy and gain access to the cd-rom drive.

[evil_roy]

so I grab the 16 floppy images from debain ..write the first 5 floppies ...rescue goes fine - put in root floppy and it all goes to hell. Help file says that debian no longer provides boot images for <12meg ram. Damn.

So debian (2.2) at least isn't going on this machine. Is there an easy way to go slack without writing all those floppies ?