Sounds like a good way to make use of old eMachines, at a large discount too.
Finally, the year of the Linux Desktop! (eMachine edition)
2 gigs of ram is going to be incredibly rough in 2025. Linux is better on old hardware but those specs are pretty optimistic.
This image is at least 10 years old
It’s at most 9 years old, as it mentions Ubuntu 16.4.
But they put Ubuntu on it
Dude, a single chrome take is going to nom the fuck out of 2gigs.
That’s correct, but you can use such low end device as your home server with services like PiHole/AdGuardHome, Invidious, Vaultwarden.
One of my low end home lab server is running invidious (YouTube front-end) on Ubuntu server 24 and just using about 900 MB RAM.
Love the “Installed and tested by Tim G.”
Hey bro you got Tim G. PC too?
Thanks Tim!
That’s probably okay if all you want to do is browse the web.
But with an Intel celeron you’re not going to get very far even if you do have a more efficient operating system.
Well it is a $20 computer. I can imagine it serving as someone’s introduction to Linux because “why not, it’s cheap enough for an experiment”.
Or not inflicting windows 11 on grandma.
You can make it work with group policy. I do whatever grandma wants.
Also bold of you to assume grandma is tech illiterate. I’ve met some “grandma age” people who are absolute wizards with tech.
Yeah the grandma I had in mind was the one that only uses her computer for bejeweled and to email you racist memes from Facebook.
If it’s a grandma it’s going to have to have enough RAM to hold the 984 Chrome tab she assists on having open at any one time. It’s going to need at least a terabyte of RAM.
You can get better hardware for free
Go to some companies in your area and ask for some old hardware. They probably have a bunch of 6/7/8th machines. They probably all have 8gb of ram and you can buy cheap sata SSDs that will vastly outperform a old beat up hard drive.
Oof, the web isn’t as light as it used to be. Some websites won’t even OPEN now with <2GB of RAM. Yes, it is that sloppy.
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Is this a reply to the right comment? I am not sure this makes sense here.
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It’s a 20$ PC. Fair enough, I say.
Not really as you can get quite a lot for not much money
I dub thee, sexbox, and she won’t leave me like all the other women did.
*Browse Wikipedia
My husband says eMachines have a pretty common capacitor problem. It’s an easy fix to remove and replace for people who know how.
Before selling, the capacitors should be visually checked, at minimum, because they can leak and that’s no good.
that’s most older electronics in some way shape or form, tho. i’d hope any reseller with space for shelves of product is doing a good look-over of everything they put up. or selling it with a disclaimer/nonguarantee.
All capacitors fail but items from around the time e machines were selling have capacitor plague and are thus more likely to fail.
It isn’t limited to just eMachines
Most of the Windows XP age hardware I’ve seen in the last few years as been dead due to capacitor failure.
This may as well be porn to me.
I know it’s an old photo but it’s funny to me how they describe the machine itself in very simple terms in a way that any person could probably understand with minimal technical knowledge (here’s the programs it has it works ok), and then there’s so much internet lingo and borderline tech speak for the reasons to opt for Linux instead of Windows lol. Could have started with “it’s faster!”
Oh you’re right! I thought this was new. But, at least as old as 2017, at least from my search.
But yes, way too tech lingo.
They also make the tired old claim that it’s immune to Windows viruses. Well yeah it’s immune to the windows versions of those viruses but there are plenty viruses for Linux and obviously Mac as well.
I get quite annoyed about this claim everyone seems to make where they claim that because you run and non-windows OS you’re suddenly immune to viruses.
I think the photo is quite old though so it was a little more true back then maybe. But it’s definitely not a statement I would make today.
I had an exact machine like this, with these specs, just with an internal Nvidia GPU and 4 extra video cards added. Using USB splitters and USB audio cards, we made that computer work for 5 users simultaneously.
Built software for initial setup (what USB mouse and KB goes with what monitor?) and it worked like a charm.
There was even enough ram available to run a single virtual box instance with Windows XP (I believe) for one single user.
The Linux desktop was skinned to look like Windows XP too and for class rooms we used… I forgot the name, some open source classroom management system where the teacher could guide students remotely
Linux is awesome
runs great on older less powerful hardware
better hardware support, not having to hunt down drivers
I remember installing Linux on my old laptop. It took me half a day to find working drivers for my WiFi card. It’s probably better now but whenever I read stuff like this I call bullshit.
it’s a lot better now to the point you don’t even need to search for drivers. I can’t even recall the last time I had to search for drivers on Linux, it just has them and some people have even made drivers for the most obscure things that not even windows supports anymore. Hell a couple months ago I found a driver someone made for something called a “Dex Drive” which was an old dongle for Playstation Memory cards.
Linux is 10x easier today. Even running windows programs is a hell of a lot easier and in many cases work the exact same way as on Windows. double click the exe, install it, you’re good to go.
WiFi cards were an iconic problem many years ago.
Nowadays I almost never have issues with WiFi
The only wifi that doesn’t work out of the box these days is broadcom cards.
For some reason MediaTek hadn’t released a Linux driver for their popular MT7902. Really annoying. Please sign this petition: https://www.change.org/p/mediatek-should-provide-a-linux-driver-for-mt7902
I learnt that the hard way …
I have had to do it one or two years ago for my previous installation, but that’s because I was using Debian on a computer whose WiFi card does not have open source drivers. But in Ubuntu it worked out of the box, and I think it may work out of the box on Debian too now that they include non free firmware by default.
You only need to install special drivers manually if you use a distro that is a bit “advanced”.
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Heroes don’t all wear capes!
No Capes!
No capes, for reason for reason, on Tux
These days I would pair that with Debian and IceWM
2gb of ram really isn’t enough
At least give them something usable. I see a lot of 6th gen machines on the market and they can be loaded with 8/16gb of ram.
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When quarantines hit and everyone was communicating via zoom, I offered to recycle people’s computers and destroy their old hard drives for free. I’d remove and drill multiple holes through the hard drives, vacuum/dust the computer, install a small, inexpensive HDD, and install Ubuntu.
Then I’d install zoom and chrome (sorry) and then pair each computer with a wired mouse, keyboard, and webcam that I had laying around in bulk. Then I’d drop these computers off at shelters, elder communities, and religious institutions. Essentially, anywhere you’d find someone who didn’t have the means to contact family, attend an interview, or whatever.
Recycling/upcycling old computers isn’t just good for the environment and your investment, it’s good for your community!
You’re doing the lord’s work, fartographer
Do we have a rimjob Steve comm?
Eh, I didn’t have much else going on and playing Jackbox remotely with my family made me realize how much others were possibly missing out. I don’t even know if or how those computers were used. I just had a lot of time on my hands and an urge to use my then-new drill. Then, I’d move the equipment out before my wife killed me and then let literally anyone else handle the logistics.
Prior to the pandemic, I’d take 20+ year-old laptops and other equipment to a friend’s ranch and we’d shoot shit. One time, I peppered myself with glass from a CRT after shooting it from a few feet away with a 16 ga.
I’m not directed by charity, I’m just wildly impulsive and occasionally productive.
Then I’d install zoom and chrome (sorry)
You monster…
Chaotic good
Why chrome?
Mainly because it’s what people knew and expected. “Other” browsers make it too easy to blame user errors on an unfamiliar environment or interface.
But most of all, it’s about picking my battles. I’m there to get employees and volunteers to help vulnerable people get connected and don’t want to get hung up on trying to educate them about privacy and ethics.
Sometimes, designing systems for non-technical people requires a little compromise on the licensing extremism that is very baked into FOSS culture.
It is why most Linux folks are stoked that Linux can play Windows games reliably — it means that millions of Windows lifers are getting exposed to Arch Linux for the first time. Sure, Steam is proprietary, and so are Nvidia drivers, but nobody decides to start with Linux and stay there (they do, but, I am talking single digit numbers vs the billions using Windows). Everyone has to start somewhere.
That said, big frown on Ubuntu. I would personally prefer something like Debian that has fewer major update increments, or an immutable Arch setup.
Sometimes you have to meet people where they are with something familiar, I’m guessing?
I guess if there’s also Firefox installed on the computers as a separate alternative browser then I wouldn’t be mad.
“Ewww, Ubuntu? Honey, don’t touch it. We’re an Arch family.”
-No one ever
“We use Arch in this house, BTW”
Ah! Nailed it.
I mean I’m bit of an Ubuntu hater, not because its bloated or whatever, but because they’re too corpo.
I stopped using it back when they put Amazon in their start menu.
Me, a Debian Enjoyer but Ubuntu Hater: 👀
