My Attempt at Spring Cleaning Backfired

[easysurfer]

Was hoping to do some spring cleaning to get rid of some clutter.

One area is I have too many old computers and computer parts. So, I was debating whether to donate an old one. Set up the computer, installed software, and computer was almost functional (simple browsing).

But instead of decided to just donate to clear off the space, next thing, I'm buying old RAM to upgrade the old PC .

This spring cleaning thing for me is a work in progress.

 

[Sunset]

You need to also get an SSD for it

 

[Jerry1]

It really is a shame how unused that old equipment is. There’s no doubt it could handle a lot of the simple tasks that many people do, like simple browsing and reading emails, but the overhead of the operating system is so great that it makes the systems obsolete. I understand that you could load a Linux OS, but then it’s hard for the people you might give it to to use as not many are as familiar with Linux as Windows or iOS. Oh well, enjoy your project. Of course your a failure at spring cleaning, but you’re an A+ student of retirement.

 

[NW-Bound]

Was hoping to do some spring cleaning to get rid of some clutter.

One area is I have too many old computers and computer parts. So, I was debating whether to donate an old one. Set up the computer, installed software, and computer was almost functional (simple browsing).

But instead of decided to just donate to clear off the space, next thing, I'm buying old RAM to upgrade the old PC .

This spring cleaning thing for me is a work in progress.

I dunno about the Web browsing thing.

A year or two ago, I resurrected an old PC which was running Windows NT, in order to run an old engineering piece of software to do a home project. While I had it running, I tried to access the Web. Nope, the old Internet browsers just could not understand all the new stuff that Web sites presented. And in order to install new browsers, I would need to update Windows. No way on these older PCs.

 

[Freedom56]

I kept one old Windows XP based computer in the event I need to update old devices that still use RS-232 and firewire interfaces. I just keep it in a closet and pull it out when I need to use it. I donated all the others.

 

[RetiredAt55.5]

I dunno about the Web browsing thing.

A year or two ago, I resurrected an old PC which was running Windows NT, in order to run an old engineering piece of software to do a home project. While I had it running, I tried to access the Web. Nope, the old Internet browsers just could not understand all the new stuff that Web sites presented. And in order to install new browsers, I would need to update Windows. No way on these older PCs.

+1

I know with my last job, the company's website was designed to use *a lot* of client side javascript, so it would be a problem on older, slower computers.

Windows NT is pretty ancient!

 

[easysurfer]

The old computer I'm upgrading with more RAM is an old Gateway desktop that came out around 2005 or 2006. Old as in pre SATA interface.

I was thinking about the spring cleaning decisions. There's at least three value factors on whether to keep or spring clean. Which include monetary, functional and sentimental.

As for the computer, low monetary, low functional, high sentimental. Without an increase of functional, the computer is just taking up space as an eyesore but has sentimental value (used to belong to a dear friend). So, if I can up the functional a bit, then maybe the computer will not be put, as the sports analogy goes, on waviers.

 

[sengsational]

Old computers are more trouble than they are worth; lurking around everything you try to do is an incompatibility. The exception is if it's stand-alone. I've got a laptop with Windows 98 that I use to program my X-10 Christmas lights. It connects RS232 to an X-10 controller. It all goes in a single box, and the first time it doesn't work, the whole thing goes in the trash.

 

[Aerides]

It really is a shame how unused that old equipment is. There’s no doubt it could handle a lot of the simple tasks that many people do, like simple browsing and reading emails, but the overhead of the operating system is so great that it makes the systems obsolete.

My bigger concern would be security. Old browsers and OS's, even if you could get them to run, you wouldn't be safe going anywhere.

 

[NW-Bound]

Windows NT is pretty ancient!

My Win NT machine was circa 1996. The CPU was a Pentium Pro. It was top-of-the-line then. I even had the one with more cache, the luxury variant. It was for work, all tax deductible too as it was for our startup. Fast SCSI HDD inside the case.

The display for this machine was a Viewsonic 21PS, which could do 1600x1200. That was top-of-the-line also, back when most people could afford only the 17" version. I spent countless hours staring at this monitor, laying out PCBs.

Oh, money, money... We managed to make money at first, so all that equipment was not for naught.

PS. Win NT was also the OS for serious use by professional. Not the Win 95/98/Me for the crowd.

 

[NW-Bound]

My bigger concern would be security. Old browsers and OS's, even if you could get them to run, you wouldn't be safe going anywhere.

I dunno. If the OS is so old, hackers may forget how to break into one.

 

[jollystomper]

OP, I feel your pain. A few weeks ago the motherboard on one of my Linux servers gave up the ghost. Being an older board (Socket AM2, DDR2 memory), the logical step would have been to move the server data to a different Linux server and consolidate. But noooooooooooooooo... I ended up getting a new socket AM4 board (the inclusion of a free case with power supply pushed me over the edge), AMD Ryzen CPU, 32GB memory... so now I have still have the same number of servers. Oh well... I still have the storage bin and 6 foot tall, 5 shelf rack stocked with older technology that I may FINALLY get around to selling/recycling this spring...

 

[NW-Bound]

Speaking of OS, lemme tell ya'all about this story.

I wrote a program to compile a huge database of engineering data, then compress it from a couple of 100s gigabytes down to 100 Gig. The main program was written in MSVC, but this program repeatedly spawned processes running under DOS to do the fundamental calculations.

The program took about 1 week running non-stop. However, it would crash after a bit more than a day. I kept on debugging it, and finally gave up when I concluded that the darn WinNT was having a memory leak that kept building up with time.

The solution was to break the task into 20 chunks. It was so that each section would be processed to completion before the memory leak caused the program to crash. By the way, I tried the same program on Win 95/98/Me, and observed the same crash.

When Win 2000 came out, I tried it. Same crash.

But when Win XP came out, darn, the very same program could now run nonstop to completion. And with faster processors and hard disks, it only took 36 hours or something like that.

 

[NW-Bound]

Come to think of it, the technology took a big jump from the early 1980s to early 1990s.

My 1st use of a PC for engineering work was on a PC XT class with 640K memory and 2 floppy drives. Of course I paid extra to get the floating-point coprocessor 8087. It was pure joy to be able to run MS Fortran compiler on your own machine, even if it took swapping out the floppy disk for different passes of the compiler.

When I finally got a 30GB RLL HDD to no longer have to swap floppies, I was in heaven.

 

[easysurfer]

OP, I feel your pain. A few weeks ago the motherboard on one of my Linux servers gave up the ghost. Being an older board (Socket AM2, DDR2 memory), the logical step would have been to move the server data to a different Linux server and consolidate. But noooooooooooooooo... I ended up getting a new socket AM4 board (the inclusion of a free case with power supply pushed me over the edge), AMD Ryzen CPU, 32GB memory... so now I have still have the same number of servers. Oh well... I still have the storage bin and 6 foot tall, 5 shelf rack stocked with older technology that I may FINALLY get around to selling/recycling this spring...

I confess to a soft spot of old computers. Especially, I prefer the beefy tower computers over a smallish form factor.

As for my PC that I'm upgrading with more RAM. When testing the other day, I did load on a distro of Linux and added a spare graphics card which I had around. With those adds, the PC was almost able to stream without out of audio/video lag. When I get the 4GB ram (currently only has 1.5GB ram), I'm hoping that will put the PC over the hump to be back to functional again.

The used RAM from ebay only set me back about $16 so worth the try to avoid waivers.

 

[NW-Bound]

Some people like electronics with vacuum tubes. Some of us like to play with old PCs.

Nothing wrong with that, and in fact vacuum tubes are now expensive like heck, while old PCs are cheap.

 

[RetiredAt55.5]

Speaking of OS, lemme tell ya'all about this story.

I wrote a program to compile a huge database of engineering data, then compress it from a couple of 100s gigabytes down to 100 Gig. The main program was written in MSVC, but this program repeatedly spawned processes running under DOS to do the fundamental calculations.

The program took about 1 week running non-stop. However, it would crash after a bit more than a day. I kept on debugging it, and finally gave up when I concluded that the darn WinNT was having a memory leak that kept building up with time.

The solution was to break the task into 20 chunks. It was so that each section would be processed to completion before the memory leak caused the program to crash. By the way, I tried the same program on Win 95/98/Me, and observed the same crash.

When Win 2000 came out, I tried it. Same crash.

But when Win XP came out, darn, the very same program could now run nonstop to completion. And with faster processors and hard disks, it only took 36 hours or something like that.

Typical Microsoft - it took them years until they finally fixed the memory leak. Actually, they probably never found it - they probably rewrote that piece of software from scratch (for other reasons), and the fix was a side effect!

 

[MRG]

Typical Microsoft - it took them years until they finally fixed the memory leak. Actually, they probably never found it - they probably rewrote that piece of software from scratch (for other reasons), and the fix was a side effect!

[emoji23]

Not just Microsoft, IBM has a long history of memory leaks and other terminal errors in their various runtimes. I've been on the receiving end of many. Heck I did what you said, modified a CICS management model to fix one of their errors and accidentally fixed another.

 

[ERD50]

Was hoping to do some spring cleaning to get rid of some clutter.

One area is I have too many old computers and computer parts. So, I was debating whether to donate an old one. Set up the computer, installed software, and computer was almost functional (simple browsing).

But instead of decided to just donate to clear off the space, next thing, I'm buying old RAM to upgrade the old PC .

This spring cleaning thing for me is a work in progress.

Hah, hah! I can relate. I'm trying to be more selective in the new-to-us home, so I don't end up with the same piles of stuff that I had in the previous place. It's a constant battle.

I dunno about the Web browsing thing.

A year or two ago, I resurrected an old PC which was running Windows NT, in order to run an old engineering piece of software to do a home project. While I had it running, I tried to access the Web. Nope, the old Internet browsers just could not understand all the new stuff that Web sites presented. And in order to install new browsers, I would need to update Windows. No way on these older PCs.

My bigger concern would be security. Old browsers and OS's, even if you could get them to run, you wouldn't be safe going anywhere.

That's what Linux is good for. There are easy to install lightweight versions that will run the latest browsers and up-to-date security on some pretty old hardware.

-ERD50

 

[Al in Ohio]

Was hoping to do some spring cleaning to get rid of some clutter.

One area is I have too many old computers and computer parts. So, I was debating whether to donate an old one. Set up the computer, installed software, and computer was almost functional (simple browsing).

But instead of decided to just donate to clear off the space, next thing, I'm buying old RAM to upgrade the old PC .

This spring cleaning thing for me is a work in progress.

My wife and I are doing the same. I filled the entire rear cargo hold (all back seats folded flat) of my Honda HRV with old computers, half a dozen wiped and hammered hard drives, printers, smart phones, cordless phones, cameras, DVD and CD players a working perfectly fine 2008 IMac, keyboards, and dozens more electronic devices. My city had a haz waste and electronics hardware removal day and a team of guys unloaded it all in 2 minutes. Also took unused antifreeze and cfl bulbs etc. some stuff had value, but it was liberating to see it get unloaded in one fell swoop.

 

[target2019]

For at least 5 years we were filling up an SUV or wagon with old computers and other electronics. A brief wait in line was followed by a quick emptying. Great stuff.

New projects seem to focus on really small devices, courtesy of smaller forms like Raspberry Pi. The Helium Miner I bought is a small cube that sits on a window sill.

I used a 10-year old iMac just yesterday to locate something F-I-L wrote long time ago. It is hard to let go of old things with associated experience.

 

[Car-Guy]

This sounds like a worthwhile activity... Like many of you, I've got enough old computer parts to start my own little store.. Not sure who would buy this old "stuff" but they do take up a lot of space.... I know I've got a couple of towers that still work (or they did when I packed them up) and three or four functioning laptops... I may keep the laptops a little longer,,,, but I'm not sure why.