>
> What would be considered a good use of older laptops? Are the machines in
Running programs :-). I don't want to sound silly, but they did useful
work once, and they can still do that same useful work. Not everyone
needs the latest bloatware, not matter what certain software houses try
to make you believe.
Obvious applicaitons (depending on processor speed and memory) include
portable text entry (you don't need much processor power to run vi :-)),
a portable terminal (something that I find very useful), if you have a
CD-ROM drive, then running acrobat to read/display all the service
manuals, etc that come on CD-ROMs (A laptop is a lot easier to balance on
top of whatever you're reparing than a desktop machine), etc, etc, etc, etc.
My most powerful laptop is the HP Portable+ (8MHz 8086 with 800+K RAM),
and I do useful work on that machine. I am sure a 386 or 486 machine
could be useful too.
> the Computer Museum being under-utilized? (http://www.computerhistory.org/)
It's not so much 'underutilising' them as not using them at all, and in
fact damaging them so they will never be used again.
> I'm not disagreeing with you, but there are a LOT of laptops (and other
> computers) out there, and there is a certain vintage that I wouldn't
> consider classic, or collectable, but I wouldn't consider them usable
I don't consider them classic either, but they surely can be useful tools...
> either. Most 386 and early 486 laptops come to mind. The cost of Pentium
> laptops are so low the 386/486 machines are basically free. Most charitable
Well, that's not the case round here. I've never seen a cheap laptop, no
matter how old...
> organizations won't accept machines that old.
Then they are mildly clueless!
-tony
Received on Mon Jun 07 2004 - 18:12:32 BST