What should I do with my old desktop?

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wilburpan · Post by **wilburpan** » Mon Jan 09, 2006 3:11 pm

I have an old PIII desktop computer at home that I'm not using for much of anything. I do have Gentoo installed on it, but the thing has only 128MB of PC100 RAM on it, so it's kind of sluggish. I'm not real interested in upgrading the RAM -- PC100 RAM is much more expensive than modern day DDR/DDR2 RAM!

I'm actually inclined to donate the thing to charity and take a tax deduction, but I thought I would take suggestions as to other things I could do with it. I considered making it into a firewall-type box, but I already have a router with a built in firewall, so I don't know what advantage that would be for me. Plus, the thing only has one ethernet port, so that would be more money I would have to put into it.

Any suggestions?

fvant · Post by **fvant** » Mon Jan 09, 2006 3:14 pm

music station
monitoring server
paperweight

rev138 · Post by **rev138** » Mon Jan 09, 2006 3:15 pm

If you're having trouble figuring out a use for it, it sounds like you don't really need it. I'd give it to charity, and let someone less fortunate get some benefit from it.

Ctrl+Alt+Del · Post by **Ctrl+Alt+Del** » Mon Jan 09, 2006 4:00 pm

Put Ubuntu on it and donate it to a place where it's actually used. (Meaning do not donate it some large ngo or similar, give it to the school or kindergarten you went to or sth of the sort...)

thoffmeyer · Post by **thoffmeyer** » Wed Jan 11, 2006 12:14 am

Use it as a server I got a PII running as a server

Avenger902 · Post by **Avenger902** » Wed Jan 11, 2006 6:33 pm

im using a p4 1.3 with 128mb for gentoo... Although its my Browsing/Downloader/Plays Mp3's and whatever else i can throw at it box, it still works well even with my ram limitation. (if anyone is wondering, im running xfce4+rox, firefox, ck sources, bittornado, etc....

Winged 2.0 · Post by **Winged 2.0** » Wed Jan 11, 2006 11:53 pm

thoffmeyer wrote:Use it as a server I got a PII running as a server

I agree. These types of computers make great servers. Just go to www.apachefriends.org and download Xampp for Linux. Simple install and a fast server since it is under Linux.

diilbert · Post by **diilbert** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 3:09 am

If I had an old PC ( I threw away my p3 board

) I would definately use it as a server.

wilburpan · Post by **wilburpan** » Fri Jan 13, 2006 2:29 am

I see plenty of suggestions to turn my old computer into a server. It's currently only got 128 MB of RAM in it. Can servers get along with just this much memory?

thoffmeyer · Post by **thoffmeyer** » Fri Jan 13, 2006 2:33 am

wilburpan wrote:I see plenty of suggestions to turn my old computer into a server. It's currently only got 128 MB of RAM in it. Can servers get along with just this much memory?

Yes, if you run a light-weight server

joey_knisch · Post by **joey_knisch** » Fri Jan 13, 2006 7:05 am

Don't install x and you will be good to go.

tpuzak · Post by **tpuzak** » Fri Jan 13, 2006 7:29 am

Make the thing into a local rsync mirror and download cache for LAN http-replicator. Then just set the thing to emerge sync at like 3 AM, and configure the other machines on your local network to sync off of it. It will really help you when you want to add more machines to your network as updates will be much faster. I have a box from the mid 90's doing that for me and it works really well. It also makes you a good person since you won't be clogging the public servers with update requests.

http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_Local_Rsync_Mirror

Tom

rev138 · Post by **rev138** » Fri Jan 13, 2006 2:12 pm

tpuzak wrote:It also makes you a good person since you won't be clogging the public servers with update requests.

Not to become repetitive, but I think donating the computer to someone less fortunate makes you a better person.