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Just wanted to show off the lowest end hardware I ever ran Linux on

Single core, 32 bit CPU, can't even do video playback on VLC. But it kinda works for some offline work, like text editing, and even emulation through zsnes! It's crazy how Linux keeps old hardware like this running.

Thankfully though, this laptop CPU is upgradable, and so is the ram, so I'm planning on revitalizing and bringing this old Itautec to the 21st century 😄

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  • Hell yeah! Love seeing old hardware like this still running a modern OS.

    With Linux, if your hardware is a decade old, you've barely even reached middle-age.

    Meanwhile Windows 11 won't even allow an official install on hardware that's 4-5 years old.

    Long live Linux & FOSS ✊

  • Up 'til 2022 or 2023 company I work for used Pentium 4 at POS PCs running ancient openSUSE. They would be still in service if it weren't for leaking/swollen caps on most motherboards. Pure power wasn't really there, but it was plenty enough to run that checkout software...

  • Those are better specs than what I used throughout college (an Asus Eee PC running Debian with Xfce and Openbox). Not a powerful machine, but I absolutely loved that thing.

  • I run a rpi zero w first gen

    • I ran it on an original Raspberry Pi B which has the same RAM and a slower CPU than the original Zero! It was still in use as a Pi-hole (running the DietPi OS) until recently where it seems to be dying or not keeping up.

  • I’m planning on revitalizing and bringing this old Itautec to the 21st century

    I think it was born in the 21st century? From this it looks like the first Celeron M was in 2004, and the first at that clockspeed was 2005.

    Also, 2GB of RAM is plenty for many purposes - that's more than any Raspberry Pi before the Pi 4 had!

    • Actually.. You're right about the 21st century lmao. I just wanted an excuse to quote Metal Gear Solid

      Also, the issue is not ram itself, of course, 2GB is enough for lots of fun on Linux, it's the CPU that's killing me

  • I booted Buildroot with kernel 5.17 on a Pentium II laptop off a CD I burned once - I needed to dump a drive once and that was the only hardware I had on hand that could dump 2.5” IDE drives and had a working CD drive so I could boot something other than the operating system installed on the drive.

  • Ubuntu 12 on an Intel atom 270m with an nvidia chip set with 125mb ram lol

149 comments