Avoid the Trash Heap: Great Uses for an Old PC
2010 was a big year for desktop and laptop PCs, but not in a good way. For the first time, smartphones outsold PCs, according to IDC, and that downward trend continues to this day. In the first quarter of 2016, global PC shipments were at 64.8 million units—down 9.6 percent compared to last year, Gartner says.
That means you might own a soon-to-be-over-the-hill personal computer. Maybe you want to junk it, because it's slow and frustrating and has made you want to pitch it out a window for months, maybe years.
We're here to tell you: no. Don't do that. If that laptop or desktop is from the last 10 years, you'd be surprised by how much life you can get out of it. Not just limping along like you were in the last few years of its pathetic attempts to run Windows 7, 8, or even 10—we're talking about ways to bring an old PC back to useful life. You may need to do some light upgrades here and there; more RAM and a big new hard drive may benefit some of these projects. But all you need in most cases is separate access to the Web and the ability to get software written to a USB flash drive to install on that old junker.
Take a gander at the options. You'll be glad you kept that old PC around.
Try a New, Lighter OSYou like to try new things? Nothing will seem newer than a freshly installed operating system on your old PC—even a downright elderly computer will feel brand new. Most alternative operating systems (translation: not Windows or MacOS) are based on Linux, which comes in a variety of options called "distros." Popular examples include Ubuntu, elementary OS, and PinguyOS. You'll find interfaces similar to Windows, and they come with a ton of included software packages. They work pretty great on PCs with 4GB of RAM or more. If you want to hand the laptop off to the kids, there are distros designed for toddlers, like Qimo (recently retired, but still available),DouDou, Sugar, and Edubuntu.
You might want to try creating your own version of a Chromebook—a computer that's essentially running Google's Chrome browser as the OS. Sadly, Google doesn't give Chrome OS away, or even sell it. There is, however, the "open source" (but still Google-controlled) Chromium OS project based on the same code. Even that's not simple to download and install. Consumers are told to buy a Chromebook laptop. However, you can download Chromium OS from ArnoldTheBat. Here's a video to help you through the whole process. Read on.....
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