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Breathing Life Into Older Computers

Posted by Hemos on from the arise-from-your-grave dept.

Aron writes "ASE Labs has written an article on using a light distribution of Linux, Damn Small Linux, to power an older computer. With Linux, older computers can be useful once again for many people. From the article: "The oldest computer I have is a Pentium 266 MMX laptop with 64MB of RAM. Most people would just consider this to be garbage and junk it, and if you brought this in for service where I work, I would agree with you. While this laptop might seem old and out-of-date now, it is small and light. I needed something I could easily carry around, so I figured I would see what I could salvage out of this dinosaur. Windows would have a hard time running on this low-spec laptop, but there are many distributions of Linux that will work exceptionally well.""

3 of 404 comments (clear)

  1. FP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    cocksuckers

  2. An extraneous problem!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    The problem remains, however, that no one uses Linux. No one uses it. No one ever will. Ever. The fact is that nothing on Linux runs on Windows and vice versa. Especially after that little stint with stealing SCO's source code and putting it in the Microsoft Source Engine (MSE). Honestly, the kernel on this laptop must be running at 32 bits of busrate and may be several megabytes large (!)
     
    Do what I do and buy an Apple Computer. They may be based on Linux, but they are better than Linux. The time you would spend setting up a 200 MegaHertz laptop would cost you two Apple Computer's.
      The CHoice is Yours.

  3. Re:Old laptops by mpapet · · Score: -1, Troll

    What's insightful about this post?

    This would be great if there was considerable WiFi support for Linux.
    Complain to the OEM's. It's their fault they haven't released docs.

    The comments regarding "sven" are inflamatory and crass. AFAIK, it still takes a human being to write device drivers, some of them are probably named Sven. That Sven might/might not work for a peripherals company is makes no difference.

    I ALWAYS had to give up either Wifi, decent Video, or sound. Seems you could pick any 2.
    This is a very inflamatory statement and very far from the current great support for Toshiba, Dell and Thinkpads.

    --
    http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html