Preupgrade (F8 to F10) fails on old machine

[Timothy Murphy]

Mikkel L. Ellertson wrote:

>> I ran preupgrade on an old machine (ThinkPad T20) running Fedora-8.
>> The first part went OK, but when I re-booted
>> it only read (or created?) 1% of install.img , and then hung.
>> 
>> Is this a normal problem?
>> If so is there are simple solution, like an addendum
>> to the grub stanza for the new system?
>> 
>> I should say, I didn't have enough space in /boot for install.img ,
>> which I imagine is normal, as we used to be told
>> to limit /boot to 100-150MB.
>> 
> It does not fail - it asks you if you want to continue. It does tell
> you that you need a wired network connection. It will then download
> the install image when the upgrade boots. You can also use a CD or
> DVD with the install image. I just did it last night - F8 to F10 -
> on this machine.

I did indeed continue.
But as I said, it only "retrieved" 1% of install.img ,
which struck me as odd.
I would have found 0% more intelligible.

I wonder if I could download install.img to / say,
and give a link to this in /boot ?