OH PLEASE HELP!!

[Chaz McGarvey]

On Tuesday, August 19, 2003, at 04:29 PM, Nakia L. Jackson wrote:

> I just built a new system for Red hat Linux.
>
> Specs:
> Red Hat Linux 9
> AMD Duron 1400 processor
> 128M SDRAM
> 40G HD
>
> I have run the install, and the system is up and running, but it is 
> SLOW as hell.  I'm not sure what I am doing wrong but I really did not 
> expect it to go this slow.  And it's really only local things... I can 
> surf the web at very good speeds...but I can not Multi-task.  Anyone 
> have any clue as to why this is happening?

Well, the Duron 1400 can't be considered a very fast processor anyway.  
You probably went with that processor because it was quite cheap or 
maybe you already had one, but you can get an Athlon 2500+ for under 
$100.  If your motherboard supports it, you may look into getting a 
better processor.

Nevertheless, your processor should give you reasonable performance 
with Linux.  Do you use a lot of applications at once?  You mentioned 
multi-tasking as a problem.  You would likely see a noticeable 
performance increase if you got some more RAM for your system (256MB or 
512MB would probably do it).

Other than that, you may want to drop into your BIOS and make sure your 
motherboard settings are correct (make sure it thinks the processor is 
what it really is).  I know that BIOS settings can sometimes make a lot 
of difference though I don't work with PC hardware very often anymore.  
Speaking of which, this may not be the best list for your problem, 
considering that Yellow Dog Linux runs on PPC hardware rather than the 
x86 hardware which you have.

Good luck,
Chaz