I have been gifted a few ancient laptops from the stone age (2005-2014). Any ideas on what I can do with them? Are there any modern Linux distros that would run on old hardware like this? I’ll take any suggestions this wonderful community has to offer.
Edit: The laptops are:
- HP 2133 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP_2133_Mini-Note_PC
- Dell Inspiron 1545 https://www.itechguides.com/product-specs/dell-inspiron-1545-specs/
- Dell Inspiron 15 3537 https://www.productindetail.com/pn/dell-inspiron-15-3537
- Toshiba C55-A5286 https://www.productindetail.com/pn/toshiba-satellite-c55-a-1n4
You don’t necessarily need a specific distro. What I always do is just use the distro I’m most comfortable with and do a minimal install that just boots to a TTY. From there I just try stuff out and see what works and what doesn’t. The HP 2133 will require a dedicated distro though since it’s a 32-Bit Machine. Consider something like https://archlinux32.org/
Right now I have a Toshiba Satellite C850D and an HP 635 and both are running relatively up-to-date Artix. I made sure both of them have an Atheros Wireless Card since those are well supported by Linux. I use them mostly to watch videos (720p works just fine especially with VAAPI) and Firefox works fine (although it’s kind of slow, but modern browsers are massively bloated tbf.). If you can you probably want to swap out all the spinning rust with SSDs.
Besides the obvious casual use, you can always turn them into file servers or maybe even a Wireless to Ethernet Network bridge.