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Do something with old computers

Are old PCs a headache or useful?

3 thoughts on “Do something with old computers”

  1. Latte Man

    Depends on what you do, or want to do with them. I have an old Gateway Handbook 486DX 33. It is of no REAL use, but is fantastic for my daughter learning to use a computer and pracitcing typing.

    I also have an old 166 MHZ Cyrix (remember them), that is running Slackware 3.x (I think they just released Version 11). It is great to help remind me of Linux Command line stuff as well as tinkering with PHP and the like.

  2. djuggler

    I thought Cyrix was going to be what Dell became. Either this workstation or my php dev server is housed in a cyrix case but long since upgraded.

    You might find that damn small linux, feather linux, or puppy linux may work on that 486dx33. Each can be burned on a live cd so no changes have to be made to the machine other than possibly the boot order in the cmos.

    Look at http://contribs.org/ (the e-smith, now Mitel, Gateway server) Simple install! Wonderful replacement for a lousy linksys router.

  3. Latte Man

    I think you are thinking of somebody else. Cyrix was a chip manufacturer. I (personally) thought they were going to become what AMD became, but they just dropped off, and then Texas Intruments bought them. Game over.

    That old Gateway Handbook doesn’t HAVE a CD-ROM drive. (They can still be purchased, but they are around $300). I thought about installing OS/2 on it, but just couldn’t bear doing that to the poor old thing.

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