Uses for old computers?

Nicom · Posted: Wed Jul 30, 2003 8:36 pm Post subject: Uses for old computers?

Is there a floppy based distro for 486's that has an mp3 player and soundcard support on it, and could this beast handle it? The specs are: 486dx33 OC'ed to 66mhz, 8mb ram, soundblaster pro 2, 2x cdrom drive, 3 130mb hdd's (max 2 usable at a time, 1 if CDROM is plugged in), 512k onboard ET4000 video. Or maybe freedos is the solution, but I'd need an efficient dos mp3 player. Are there any other good uses I can put this thing to? I have no ISA network cards, only an old 14.4 modem. Currently I use it for old dos games (x-wing is still the best space sim!), and the occasional word proccessing task on microsoft works with windows 3.11. I planning on trying freedos on one of those hdd's anyway, any word on it's compatability with dos games and windows 3.x? Should I track down an ISA net card and use it as a firewall or something? I know some people here have come up with fun uses for old hardware.

EDIT: Changed title for thread consolidation. --pjp
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antik · Apprentice Joined: 01 Oct 2002 Posts: 212

hook · Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2003 2:55 am Post subject:

mp3 on a 486? ...wow, you truely have to be a mastermind to acomplish that! ...i've been using linux on my 486 for quite some years and i mp3blaster worked pretty sluggish, but it worked ...i was using a slackware (most packages precompiled) though ...please do report your success

check distrowatch, or even make one yourself :] ...a floppy-distro destined to run mp3/ogg-vorbis AND capable of doing it on a 486 would probably be one of the most wanted distros ever

...go for it!!!
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Moled · l33t Joined: 09 Jul 2003 Posts: 635

antibiotic · Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2003 4:29 am Post subject:

Hey, dont diss 486, I've run mp3s perfectly with it, with 32 megs of RAM....well, I couldnt do anything else, I might note, but still :lol:

EDIT: erm, that was on Winbl0ze :oops:

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Mindstab · Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2003 6:14 am Post subject:

do you mean floppy installable, or floppy based distro?

Nicom · Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2003 6:41 am Post subject:

Floppy installable is fine, as long as it's not too big (130mb hdd's).

zhenlin · Veteran Joined: 09 Nov 2002 Posts: 1361

486... Why don't you learn some assembly language? Old computers are best for these kinds of things. If you manage to blow away the hard disk or zap the BIOS, at least you don't have to cry as much.

ozak · n00b Joined: 02 Jan 2004 Posts: 36 Location: USA

Well, I have just come into control of an old computer.
It's got a pentium 2 300ish mhz processor and about 128mbs of sdram.
I'm not really sure what i wanna do with it becuase i wanted to use it as sort of a fileserver, but it's only got a 300mb hd. Thus, I did a hd install of damnsmalllinux and as of now it's just sitting here, not doign much.
It does have an ethernet card, so it could run some sort of server, I'm just not sure what i could use it for.
Any ideas?

lghman · Guru Joined: 29 Nov 2002 Posts: 548 Location: Florida

I have an old 486 running as a firewall/router. Seems to be the most logical place for older hardware.

--sonik
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cuban · Guru Joined: 23 Aug 2003 Posts: 448 Location: Houston, TX

Firewall? Router? Proxy?

Also, you might check out privoxy. I have an older machine running that for me. Helps reduce website pollution. It blocks ad's, 1x1 web bugs, flash (on websites you specify), popups (if you don't use mozilla already :-P

), and a bunch of other things I can't even remember because I never see them!

Check it out...[/url]
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ozak · n00b Joined: 02 Jan 2004 Posts: 36 Location: USA

that privoxy thing seems like a really good idea.
I might just set it up now.
Thanks.

Vanquirius · Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2004 8:52 pm Post subject:

Router/firewall is probably its best usage, that's what I have done with my Pentium 100.

If you think it can handle running a few daemons, you might want to give apache and pure-ftp a shot. This is a pretty good solution for sharing files with friends and when you need remote access to your files (from college, for example). Up[load] and down[load].

If you had a little more disk space you could also run a game server of some sort... Counter-Strike, Neverwinter Nights... But that is way too much trouble if you're not into the game yourself.
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homeobocks · Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2004 9:05 pm Post subject:

Mister Bill · Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2004 10:04 pm Post subject:

While I'm killing time emerging my system, what would be a good use for a Macintosh PowerPC that's probably 66Mhz or so, has a 1GB HD, and I think 32MB RAM?
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Brother Dysk · Posted: Sun Jan 25, 2004 2:18 am Post subject:

Distcc? OpenMosix?

Hey, every little bit helps.

Moled · l33t Joined: 09 Jul 2003 Posts: 635

Brother Dysk · Posted: Sun Jan 25, 2004 2:30 am Post subject:

Sod yes. Old hardware's more fun than new hardware!

Play around with one of the well early Mac OSes

shash · Apprentice Joined: 18 Apr 2003 Posts: 220 Location: India

If you have no use for a server, cluster it and use it for distcc or something.

Or, set up a basic system on it, run X clients and allow more than one person to use the main system.

My dad still uses mostly Pentiums in his office. Until recently, there were two 386s and one 286 (or the other way around). That was enough for basically a glorified typewriter, that does wordprocessing and then printing. Lots of small things still run quite well on older systems, including surfing the web if your big guy's caught up doing a mammoth compile.

woodwizzle · Apprentice Joined: 30 Nov 2003 Posts: 225

I've been collecting used and broken PCs for a while. I've finally gotten around to salvaging all the good parts and putting togethor two boxes. The nicer of which I'm gonna turn into a media box for the living room, the other I don't know what to do with

But it'd be a shame to waste it! Its a 100mhz pentium with 16MB of ram and a 3GB hard drive. I know I could turn it into a router but I've already got a perfectly fine one. Any ideas on how to put this box to use?

VOTBLINDUB · Posted: Sun Jan 25, 2004 5:14 am Post subject:

everything but using it as target practice has been said.

oniq · Guru Joined: 02 Sep 2002 Posts: 597 Location: Connecticut

Whats with the subject and body not going together?!

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woodwizzle · Apprentice Joined: 30 Nov 2003 Posts: 225

Argh, my bad. I posted this in text mode links. I don't know how that got there.

spacejock · Posted: Sun Jan 25, 2004 5:32 am Post subject:

Run LTSP on your main box, use this one as a terminal. Sitting in front of it, you won't be able to tell it's not running at xghz. (Assuming 100mb/s network cards)

Cheers
Simon
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st. anger · Apprentice Joined: 30 Oct 2002 Posts: 273

I have a pentium 166 set up as a dial-in server. I also have a 200Mhz one with an 8GIG HDD i use to share my mp3s to my two main PCs.
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