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You also need at least 512 MB for a faster install. 256 MB will install, but significantly slower. And god help you if your computer has unsupported hardware. An unsupported NIC, CD/DVD, or video card can lead to a system install hang. Or at least several minutes before it times out.

Very often you have the time to install the system, and really, it doesn´t take THAT much time.

I know, you will prob. say that an administrator does not have the time when an sytem crashes. No, they don´t, that is why they have an dump or jumpstart CD to speed it up a little bit.

Also, i think that people only compares it to Linux for example, why compare it. Be happy that it installs and that you can use it and that it is very stable when installed.


And, AndrewZ, it has never slowed down on y machines because it found Hardware that was not supported, it just didn´t install them.

It feels that every comment tree for every article on osnews has some kind of whining from people.

Enable DMA. Solaris goes from installing slowly to rather quickly.

http://www.sun.drydog.com/faq/s86faq.html#4.13

I'm not sure if this is still true for Sol10, as I no longer install from CD when possible.

We can jumpstart a 4GB flash archive in 1 hour.

You're doing something wrong.

I'm not whining, I'm bitching. And I'm bitching because I have tried to install Solaris 11 about 10 times at least on various PC configurations. I have had it hang many times, and have probably spent about 20 hours of install jiggering. I can tell you straight out that compared to Linux (red hat), Windows, and BeOS, the Solaris install is very unforgiving.

I have also talked to Solaris support engineers who have said that even if a general device is listed on the HCL that doesn't mean it is supported. In my case it was a SIG SATA card. Although the chip was a match it was not detected by the Solaris install, and the Solaris tech could not make it work. I was out of luck.

Admittedly I have pushed the edge of what is considered supported, but it would be nice to not have the install hang like it does.

I can give various hardware configurations if anyone is interested.

That being said I think Solaris has a lot going for it. I just think the install could be more forgiving and less error prone. Like the installation for Linux (red hat), Windows, and BeOS (long live BeOS ;-) )

I have Ultra10 (440MHZ US-IIi model) and a Dell Inspiron 8200 notebook(Pentium 4 Mobile at 1600MHz) and average the same time installing Solaris 10 (both IDE disks and 512Mb RAM). The Ultra10 is a bit lite slowly than Pentium4 Mobile, but five/ten minutes (1:55min average).

But this sucks, a long time installing full OS... The installer is not very friendly and I can say that this is from MS-DOS times. I think that the installer needs change system packaging to something similar such pkg-get.

I'm dreaming with Gentoo/portage packe system in the future with OpenSolaris too :-)

Sorry for my lite english, It's very easy to understand reading but not for reading ;-)

It's very easy to understand reading but not for WRITING :-P

I agree with the fact of DMA, it's enabled by default in both DVD and CDRW drives from my notebook. I don't known it in my SPARC, but rans OK...

Regards

Robert, this is Solaris Express from December 05 (12/05 I think), not just Solaris 10... The Inspiron's hardware is very compatible with Solaris 10 (Express and Release) 100% in HCL

Graphical mode and interactive installation (full OS plus OEM)

Thank you for the info for the DMA in SPARC :-)

Cheers!

The slowness comes from constantly updating a central package list for each package install.

If you install a package that consists of a single shell script, you must read, update, sort, and write this list.

If you install a package that is 10GB of files, you have to update this list.

If you have 2 packages on the system, this is not a problem. If you have 10,000 packages, it IS a problem.

If you're doing an install from a Flash or Jumpstart, you don't HAVE this problem, as the packages are already installed and you're simply moving files and updating some configuration files.

The simple point is that this is a legacy system (the pkg-add system) dating from the late 80's or early 90's that's never really been updated (at least in terms of its storage mechanism or central directory format), and since most serious users of Solaris DO use Jumpstart and/or Flash archives, in practical, real world use, it's mostly a non-issue.

But when you suddenly have a million people, all installing it the first time, or who don't plan to have jumpstart servers handy, it raises its ugly head.

Here are a few more points of constructive criticism re: Solaris install.

The installation requires a certain non-trivial grasp of various Solaris internals. Not the least of which is choosing which of the four installation methods you want. Too bad to can't click on Help and get information on which one is appropriate for your use.

In fact there are several points in the install where there is actually a help button, but you get an error message if you haven't established network connectivity when you click.

It would be nice to know what you need to understand in order to perform a correct install. Since you don't know what you need to know you just end up feeling stupid. Some might say this is appropriate 8-), I say that's not going to provide a very good "out of the box" experience for the many one-time people who try to install Solaris. It's not good usability.