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I love old computers, but I also admit that there is a reason that we’ve all moved on to newer machines. This challenge may make us all appreciate our new hardw

I love old computers, but I also admit that there is a reason that we’ve all moved on to newer machines. This challenge may make us all appreciate our new hardware a bit more. The biggest issue I see with this (for most of us) would be the RAM limit. The article did say that more RAM was “okay,” so perhaps this would be doable. The primary roadblocks in my case would be communication tools and websites required for work (JIRA, Slack). There is a JIRA cli tool I found on github, and a cli client for Slack. I could probably get those running in Cygwin on Win2K or WinXP. KMeleon is still around with a Goanna version, so I may be able to get the rest of my web needs met. Email is email, so no worries. An older version of Notepad++ could serve as my IDE, but maybe something like Scintilla or even JOE on Cygwin would be better. I may do it… the question is, do I got for early AMD64, a p3 or p4, or do I really punish myself and go back to a p1 with win98 and kernelex? For those curious, I wouldn’t actually recommend trying Linux on an older machine unless you’re willing to custom compile your system. I do a lot of retro computing, and modern Linux is just kind of big. You can make it smaller, and there are distributions custom built for the purpose, but they do not (in my experience) deliver the kind of performance that vintage OSs do on vintage hardware. If anyone knows of projects that do, please let me know!

Pfiffer 4y ago
You could use Ripcord as your slack client and save a bunch of ram. https://cancel.fm/ripcord/ https://cancel.fm/ripcord/
pabs3 4y ago
Not everyone can financially afford new machines. Also not everyone can accommodate the changes in modern machines. Many moved to smartphones, but they have small screens and are always online, which might not suit everyone.
unregistereddev 4y ago
Having played with a lot of old hardware just for nostalgia, I do not recommend going back to a P1 with win98. It doesn't support modern encryption, which means even if you can get a modern-ish browser working (KMeleon 1.54 is the last version that supports win98), most of the web will be unusable. It's still nostalgic fun to boot win98 (or win95c, which was the first build to offer usb support) on an old workstation, but it's nearly impossible to use it for anything beyond offline writing, nostalgia, and vintage games.
guenthert 4y ago
> For those curious, I wouldn’t actually recommend trying Linux on an older machine unless you’re willing to custom compile your system, I do a lot of retro computing, and modern Linux is just kind of big. I don't follow. Win2K is ok on older machines, but for Linux it must be a 'modern' one? I can assure you that a Linux distribution of the Win2K era will run at least as efficiently on such hardware as Win2K. I wouldn't necessarily recommend going on-line with either though. If one absolutely must run current software on museum-piece hardware, then I'd recommend NetBSD for which time moves much more slowly than Linux.
- Shared404 4y ago
  > then I'd recommend NetBSD for which time moves much more slowly than Linux. I've personally had success with Arch/Alpine/Void style distro's and a window manager. Modern Linux doesn't have to be big.
helf 4y ago
The allowance for RDP/VNC and similar also kinda negates all this, imo. There is also no frequency restriction. You can (and I did) clock something like a single core Conroe-L Celeron 430 that is normally 1.8ghz to ~3-4ghz (I managed ~4.1 on mine but seems most people probably could only do around 3.5-3.6ghz which is still a gigantic overclock). I guarantee you that would run almost anything you throw at it that isn't gaming or video editing with gusto. edit I just realized the Celeron 430 is 16 years old now. Augh. Time keeps on slippin' by.

Pfiffer 4y ago

You could use Ripcord as your slack client and save a bunch of ram. https://cancel.fm/ripcord/ https://cancel.fm/ripcord/

pabs3 4y ago

Not everyone can financially afford new machines. Also not everyone can accommodate the changes in modern machines. Many moved to smartphones, but they have small screens and are always online, which might not suit everyone.

unregistereddev 4y ago

Having played with a lot of old hardware just for nostalgia, I do not recommend going back to a P1 with win98. It doesn't support modern encryption, which means even if you can get a modern-ish browser working (KMeleon 1.54 is the last version that supports win98), most of the web will be unusable. It's still nostalgic fun to boot win98 (or win95c, which was the first build to offer usb support) on an old workstation, but it's nearly impossible to use it for anything beyond offline writing, nostalgia, and vintage games.

guenthert 4y ago

> For those curious, I wouldn’t actually recommend trying Linux on an older machine unless you’re willing to custom compile your system, I do a lot of retro computing, and modern Linux is just kind of big. I don't follow. Win2K is ok on older machines, but for Linux it must be a 'modern' one? I can assure you that a Linux distribution of the Win2K era will run at least as efficiently on such hardware as Win2K. I wouldn't necessarily recommend going on-line with either though. If one absolutely must run current software on museum-piece hardware, then I'd recommend NetBSD for which time moves much more slowly than Linux.

Shared404 4y ago
> then I'd recommend NetBSD for which time moves much more slowly than Linux. I've personally had success with Arch/Alpine/Void style distro's and a window manager. Modern Linux doesn't have to be big.

helf 4y ago

The allowance for RDP/VNC and similar also kinda negates all this, imo. There is also no frequency restriction. You can (and I did) clock something like a single core Conroe-L Celeron 430 that is normally 1.8ghz to ~3-4ghz (I managed ~4.1 on mine but seems most people probably could only do around 3.5-3.6ghz which is still a gigantic overclock). I guarantee you that would run almost anything you throw at it that isn't gaming or video editing with gusto. edit I just realized the Celeron 430 is 16 years old now. Augh. Time keeps on slippin' by.