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DS homebrew announcements > New test kernel for DSLinux users with no Slot-2 RAM

#154888 - sonny_jim - Tue Apr 22, 2008 12:50 pm

I've put together a test kernel that has a lot of things stripped out and changed to hopefully squeeze out a few more kB for those people who are using DSLinux without some kind supported Slot-2 RAM. Please note that if you are using Slot-2 RAM you will not gain anything from using this kernel.

http://two.xthost.info/dslinux/dslinux-initramfs.nds.zip

http://rapidshare.com/files/109273298/dslinux-initramfs.nds.zip.html


To get it smaller, I've replaced the romfs system with initramfs, which means root is fully rw with permissions now, including /dev. I've also used a stripped down busybox binary. I've taken sound out of this test kernel (mp3 playing with DSLinux sucks anyway), so web surfing only really. Links still won't load but at least retawq should play a bit nicer now.

To use, unzip and place "dslinux-initramfs.nds" to the root of a card that already has a copy of DSLinux installed (ie, has a /linux folder).

If you don't have a /linux folder (because you've never used DSLinux before or you've been using the NDS build) grab a copy of the DLDI build here.

On my Acekard, free shows this:

Kineox DLDI build:
Code:

MemTotal: 2056kB
MemFree: 804kB
Buffers: 132kB


dslinux-initramfs build
Code:

MemTotal: 2800kB
MemFree: 868kB
Buffers: 120kB


It's still quite prone to crashing, but at least it's a tiny bit better. To save even more memory you could try this:

Code:

/usr/bin/coreutils/mv /bin/busybox /media/usr/bin/busybox2
/usr/bin/coreutils/ln -s /media/usr/bin/busybox2 /bin/busybox


I plan to integrate initramfs into the DLDI builds anyway at some point as it makes working with /dev a lot easier.