[voltagex_]

When I'm building tiny Debian images, I use debootstrap, which doesn't seem to use much RAM at all.

There used to be a Fedora equivalent called febootstrap, but it looks like it's mutated a bit since then: http://people.redhat.com/~rjones/supermin/

You may be able to work around it that way.

Out of interest, what machine are you using CentOS 6 on? I find 128mb kinda tight - although I've recently found a VPS provider who's managed to get Debian Jessie working in 96!

[stevekemp]

Once upon the time I created "rinse" which is an RPM-using debootstrap-like tool.

I've handed that off now, but the project is still very much alive:

http://collab-maint.alioth.debian.org/rinse/

[sliverstorm]

BuyVM, $15/year

The good news is BuyVM just announced they are preparing a CentOS 7 image, so the installer RAM limit may not matter.

You are right that 128mb is a bit tight, I have problems with some services that just gobble memory. Apache+PHP are terrible in that regard.