Quote:
Originally Posted by J_Player
This is true.
Many of the newer distributions of Linux will also run on antique equipment. I think Knoppix might work. It can be installed on a camera flash card to use as a hard drive for running linux at the USB port, while the real hard drive is used only as a data disk. Or it can be installed on the hard disk too. There are also other distributions that may work.
But if a person wanted to run Windows on antique hardware, then maybe Windows 98 would work. It was designed to run on 286, 386, and 486 computers. Maybe Windows 3.1 would be good too. These earlier windows versions were still resource hogs, but nothing near as bad as NT and later. They were made to work with limited memory and a weak processor without multi-threading. I remember running Windows 98 from a 486 PC / 128 MB ram and a 10 GB hard disk, and it was very stable. The real IE cache was accessible without hacking any hidden directories. It was my favourite version of Windows for a long time.
One good thing about using antique windows versions is hackers are not looking for new ways to exploit these versions or write new viruses for them. In that respect, they may be better than using XP, Vista or Windows 7. I suppose if someone installed Windows 98, it would be good to install an old version of Netscape for web surfing.
Funny... I have never bothered to install a firewall or anti-virus or adware remover on my Ubuntu or other Linux machines. And I never ever got a hint of web malware on Ubuntu. For now, Ubuntu is my favourite Linux because it is the easiest to use with fewest things to type and click. I can still open a terminal any time I want to do some serious control on the system, but when I'm in a hurry I can get things done fast like when Windows is working ok. Of course, other Linux distributions that don't have all the Ubuntu GUI features installed run faster, but who cares when the machine is running lightning fast?
Best wishes,
J_P
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Hi,
yes, indeed, win98 is a good alternative for obsolete hardware... at latest patches installed (MS then discontinued it) it's enough stable for web surfing and even to create documents and office stuff...
The serious things to have installed are probably a firewall and an antivirus/antispyware.
Once installed that way the system can run out of troubles for years...also.
The big issues become then installing software (of course old software cause newer will never run on resources of an old machine... apart special cases like Irfanview that runs fine on win9
.
Installing software is a trouble cause you can get viruses and trojan horses easy that way... and tons of spyware also.
The spyware removers work but the common pitfall in win98 is that once you made damages on registry you cannot recover good if didn't made a copy before the mess...
A nice alternative to win98 is millenium edition... cause have safety recovery points... your system will be restored to the latest if you want... and you don't lose data.
But millenium has its drawbacks too... and for that is close to 98.
If the machine supports XP sp2 one can try (some pentium2 or more...need at least 256MB RAM, to the limit, and 4-5Gigabytes of disks , the more the better...)
But if you install XP sp2 on such a machine... the space will be occupied very soon... better have 10-20Gygabytes at minimum... much better. Otherwise a solution is made a complete full image of disk (on a DVD for example) and when it slows down cause lack of space or crash restore using disk images... took some 10-15minutes max.
All workable solution, but all with side effects and troubles of various kind.
Much better is old hardware and linux... much more reliable also.
Anyway, these are extreme solutions... just to setup a working machine... in emergency or where no other hardware available there... (e.g. your new PC exploded and you cannot get one but need in a hurry....). Not common problem... cause people often have many and new PCs, Apple and other things...
But people who wanna (or must) stay cheap can make their trashware their own this way and have a working computer.
Much important is the network stuff... use e.g. a router with internal hardware firewall is another important issue to avoid troubles... people sometimes use USB-modems or old analog stuff... these are not that good about security cause machine is exposed to any kind of attack from anywhere...
I know people who made "trashware" as hobby... some of these recycled things and then sent to africa...and usually run linux...
But I think it's also another way, sponsored by many organisations, to sent some trash there and forget about costs of waste removal in modern countries...
Then the trashware sometimes find its way to china for part and materials recycling... no good...
Kind regards,
Max