All of us have an old PC or a laptop laying around, there is some ways to revive it, make it useful, connect to your audio rig for mp3 or videos, or for your young kid that needs for school.
Here we explore some solutions to give our old pc a second wind.
Fist we need to know how old is it?, if is before 2004 probably is 32 bits, that means is probably slow and has no more than 3 Gigabytes of ram or less,
If you have those slow computers I recommend using Linux Mint, that is very light, usually has most of the drivers packed in and has a really good store where you can find apps that are still relevant and works in our modern internet.
Other option is use windows XP, is old but works fine, just add an antivirus that is cloud based so don’t impact the overall speed.
Lets see the Linux Mint option:
LinuxMint is a very powerful OS that is light to run in old laptops and computers, I have it for a few years on my Lenovo T500 series. You can download from their official website,
There are 3 versions, I usually install the Cinammon unless the computer is slow and very old, then I will try the other two options.
To install you need to download the ISO, use Rufus to make a bootable USB drive.
Once you installation runs, is good idea to connect to the internet so Mint can find and download the drivers of your old computer, most of the time should work fine.
If you run into troubles there is a detailed guide in their website.
The Windows XP option:
You can still install WindowsXP, why?, because most of those old computers had XP, you can probably still find those drivers and there is still a lot of software that works in XP.
If you are looking an ISO, you can downloaded form the Archive.org(HERE).
I believe this version is an OEM version and should have the no problems with the serials, but I suggest to read the readme.txt inside.
The problem with XP is that is sometimes is hard to find the drivers, write down the brand, model of the laptop or the motherboard and begin the search in the internet and forums, sometimes reddit, you will need them later on if something is missing, or the audio is not working.
Upgrade your hard drive to a SSD.
Is good idea to upgrade your old hard drive to an SSD for the OS, why?, because that old computer could have 15 years or more, and motors in the drive has their lifetime, also they are slow. A SSD will be very fast, it will make your computer boot almost in seconds and if has low ram memory the swamp is very fast. You don’t need an expensive SSD, 125Gig should be enough and is below the 100$.
Most of the hard drives are SATA, is an small interface that connect to your motherboard or laptop, but some old computers have an interface called IDE, the very old ones have 40 pins, newer 80 pins, but still an adaptor is needed, in eBay are some, but is a cost to add.
Old computers still can live in our homes, you can still browse the internet, write documents and listen music, and play some 2D games!.
This was part of my old blog, The IT Cat, now moved to my main site.