Why buy a new PC ? Spring clean and update the old one.

Ramz_3

I think my old PC lived up to a lot, I had it for 7 years running on ME and the only upgrades I had were halfway through, an additional 128mb of RAM (totalling to 256), and an extra 20 gigs hard drive (totalling to 40gb).

It was fine for word processing and browsing the net, but it had USB 1.0 which was REALLY annoying for transferring music to an mp3 player. Plus, the only games I seemed to be able to play was the good old command & conquer games. (dont get me wrong, i love c&c, but i was pretty eager to player tiberium wars)

leomburke

For anyone wanting to really get to know their PC I would suggest Linux.
Please don't all start to flame about it being 'too hard for us' - its not. People say it is too hard because it is a little different and doesn't hold your hand as much as Windows.
I appreciate that this is not the best move for gamers as most games are still on Windows but for a lot of people who just use the internet (Firefox) and email (Thunderbird) Linux is a great OS - I have been using it for years and don't actually use Windows at all any more and that includes advanced features such as image manipulation, VPN & Virtualisation.
Head over to www.distrowatch.com and use the search options to find Distro's that are for older hardware. You can even 'dual-boot' (run Windows & Linux at the same time to see if you like it) and the best thing is:

**LINUX IS FREE** - This is MSE after all!

[Deleted User]

So, rather than i) wipe your PC, ii) reinstall the OS you already paid for iii) reinstall the apps you've paid for iv) reinstall the games you've paid for

you'd rather people install linux, learn a new OS, not play games anymore and not use the apps they've paid for before? It's hardly very MSE throwing out all the stuff you've paid for in the past when it's still perfectly usable.

superscaper

ringo_24601 wrote: »

you'd rather people install linux, learn a new OS, not play games anymore and not use the apps they've paid for before? It's hardly very MSE throwing out all the stuff you've paid for in the past when it's still perfectly usable.

As great as linux is and as many drivers as there are, they still don't support nearly as much hardware as Windows, as the manufacturers of most hardware are geared towards supporting windows and supplying drivers for windows only etc. I've played around with linux myself and have found I would have to replace some hardware (wireless dongle, ethernet card etc) in an old pc I was trying it with, which wasn't worth it. So there could be hidden expenses on top of what ringo_24601 mentioned. It's not the holy grail people make it out to be, at least not yet. I wouldn't consider using it on my main pc until there's much better support for it.

leomburke

Based on the reply of ringo_24601 (whats wrong with using your own name and not hiding behind a stupid name?) I am canceling my account which I opened in the hope of technically helping people.
It is now obvious that the "techies" in this forum are very narrow-minded and would rather install the bloatware/security hole-ridden OS that is Windows as well as that pirated copy of MS Office that you picked up on bit-torrent and the games that you waste your life playing than install a decent OS with real support and help channels.
Instead of playing these games try actually learning about the open-source movement and the reason it is making so much ground on Windows and closed-source applications. Maybe then you will see Windows for the poor OS it really is

'Superscraper' I understand your concerns (at least you are more articulate than 'ringo') but support is growing at a phenomenal speed. Without trying to belittle you (i appreciate that a *very* small amount of hardware is not supported) could it not be the fact that you didn't know which options to turn on in the kernel to enable the hardware that you wanted. Windows installs everything and picks from that. Linux installs only what you need/ask for and runs from there. You notice a large performance boost on older PII machines with as little as 128Mb RAM and only a 8-10GB HDD.

I am afraid that you can't call yourself a real 'techie' (what an awful word) without being willing and able to try out UNIX based equivalents to the proprietary junk that is Windows. Until you can actually configure an 'X' server and GNOME (the 'pretty' front bits) then i am afraid that you are no more technically minded than my grandma.

This is not intended as an insult to everyone who uses Windows but merely those who dismiss Linux without thought. It is people like 'ringo' who cause the confusion and panic amongst normal users and insist that they cant switch as its 'too hard'. Nothing could be further from the truth. If anyone reading this has a brain of their own and is interested in computing on a level higher than knowing how to kill a monster in Doom or how to make a 'sim' wipe his own ar*e then I suggest you take the advice of my previous post and invest some time in learning a quality operating system without the security flaws or constraints of M$ Windows.

</fin>

superscaper

leomburke wrote: »

'Superscraper' I understand your concerns (at least you are more articulate than 'ringo') but support is growing at a phenomenal speed. Without trying to belittle you (i appreciate that a *very* small amount of hardware is not supported) could it not be the fact that you didn't know which options to turn on in the kernel to enable the hardware that you wanted.

Believe me I'd tried everything and I manually installed the ndiswrapper myself and made sure it was activated and detected the dongle. It simply wouldn't sustain a data stream once connected to an unsecured wifi network (I couldn't get it to even connect to a secured network). The only real solution from the linux community was to ditch the dongle altogether which defeated my purpose in only using my left over parts. (If anyone wants to move to linux I'd definitely check any Netgear hardware they have) I'm not dismissing linux at all, just that people should experiment (probably with livecd/dual boot) first and be prepared that they may not get everything working properly with it. And I usually advise pretty much the same thing if moving over from XP to Vista.

I have to say it's unfortunate that you have such a narrow minded view for defining "techie". This board is for solving all types of techie problems and many different people will have various expertise which will be useful for the context of questions involved. I personally don't have that much experience of unix (only a few afternoon courses at uni) but I think a lot of people would still describe me as "techie" and probably more technically minded than your grandma (although I'm presuming she isn't some engineer or something from your tone). I'm personally currently completing a PhD in Nanoelectronics but from your definition I don't fall into the category of "technically minded" just because I haven't had much reason to use a specific operating system.

If you can help people using your expertise in unix and linux then by all means, the more expertise on the site the better, but you shouldn't think that is the exclusive domain of the "technical" and people have "techie" problems that have nothing to do with OSes and you have belittled I'd say the majority of people here in not respecting the knowledge of others just because it may be different to your own.

mjr600

Yet another thread hijacked for the sake of petty technical arguements by self absorbed a_n_a_l geeks.

If you have a simple, helpful, free and easy piece of advice for MSE users please tell us, otherwise clear off and play with the gamers who took advice and went the same way.

superscaper

mjr600 wrote: »

Yet another thread hijacked for the sake of petty technical arguements by self absorbed a_n_a_l geeks.

Discussing the pros and cons of changing OS to improve the longevity and usefulness of a pc isn't in my opinion going off topic. In fact my entire experience was all about making use of an old pc that otherwise might have got dumped. Warning of potential pitfalls of suggestions from personal experience in "spring cleaning" an old pc using those suggestions is hardly hijacking with "petty technical arguments". (Unless you aren't referring to me, then I apologise but if you are I wholeheartedly disagree).

wolfman

Hmmm I think ringo had a point to a certain extent.

The majority of users here aren't very technical, they're looking for technical support. And most will be using Windows (probably XP). Suggesting Linux is all good and well, but many won't be able to, or won't want to take that step. Some however, will though.

As mentioned Linux is a good solution, but not the be-all-and-end-all solution. I'm a Linux user at home, but Windows at work. I've got it running very nicely, but it's taken me time, and I'm always playing around with it trying to get various music players/tv cards etc... to work.

Linux may be free, but it's takes time to learn and adapt to. It's an operating system for someone that wants to spend time learning and setting up their system. This will apply to some people but of course not everyone. In fact many just want something that works. Hence you have to cater for all operating systems when giving advice here.



And mjr600, the thread has barely been hijacked. To be honest you've raised a thread that would otherwise disappear off into the past, if anything the OS discussion has kept it at the top of the board.

And it's just as relevant. Using Linux on an old machine is an excellent way of getting more out of it when it can no longer cope with Windows. If you raise a very general thread, expect general comments.

leomburke

I feel I must take back the 'techie' comment as it was said in the heat of the moment without thought (much in the same way as ringo made his point). Technical minded people can of course use any OS although the vast majority that i know do indeed use some sort of UNIX system. superscraper I apologise to you and to any other technical people who took offense to my post. The main points re: Linux do still stand though.

wolfman - I appreciate that Linux takes time to learn and adapt to but so did windows 3.11 coming from DOS then windows 95/98/ME from there and XP from there. Vista is just as steep a learning curve from XP as Linux (Ubuntu runs virtually out of the box and is a live CD for testing first). The reason i raised Linux is because now is the best time for people to switch to it due to the fact that Vista is a similar learning curve. I appreciate that the majority of users here are not too technical but the more non-technical people use Linux then the more we will have a suitable user base to build new and wanted improvements and software on top of this already excellent OS.

Finally mjr600 - i agree with the previous 2 posts. Linux is highly relevant to old PCs (i run one myself as a 2nd PC / Router). The gamers can go where they like but:
1) Please don't group geeks (I am one and I admit it) with Gamers - its not nice.
2) This relates to older PCs whereas the gamers wanted newer ones.

I will shut up about it now if thats what people want :-)

(diatribe over)