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+--- Thread: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop (/showthread.php?tid=110627)
Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - DaviDC. - 01-22-2011
This thing took at least 15 minutes to start up with XP & was always slooooow.
I finally managed to get ubuntu 10.10 installed on it & now it starts up in less than 2 minutes.
I dug around in my junk drawer & found a 160 GB hard drive to put in it & swapped out the CD drive for a DVD drive.
It's got 256 MB of DDR SDRAM & I know that's got to be a hinderance. As hard as I've looked, there doesn't seem to be any spare RAM of that type around here. Still, it's now a much better computer than when I brought it home.
Re: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - mattkime - 01-22-2011
i did that recently too. worked really well. i was impressed.
whatcha gonna use it for?
Re: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - DaviDC. - 01-22-2011
I have absolutely no use at all for it.
Re: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - lafinfil - 01-22-2011
Put it out on the back porch. The heat should keep the washer from freezing again.
Re: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - DaviDC. - 01-22-2011
lafinfil wrote:
Put it out on the back porch. The heat should keep the washer from freezing again.
It doesn't seem to put out that much heat. Nothing at all like a G5 tower.
I just tried to play a DVD in it but had no luck. I looked for a different DVD player but got bored so I shut it down for the evening. Using that gargantuan Dell keyboard on a board on my lap does not make for a pleasant computing experience. I need a compact keyboard but don't plan on spending any money on this beast. That's something I might be able to come across at a thrift store.
Re: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - silvarios - 01-22-2011
You have to install the appropriate tools to decrypt the DVD.
Re: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - DaviDC. - 01-22-2011
VLC wouldn't play it either.
Re: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - mattkime - 01-22-2011
I donated through this org - http://www.cristina.org/donate.html
the machine was placed with an nyc public school. they picked it up.
much better than tossing the machine.
Re: Breathed new life into an old Dell Dimension desktop - silvarios - 01-22-2011
DaviDC. wrote:
VLC wouldn't play it either.
libdvdcss2, VLC won't work without the right library.