RE: tlug: Giving an old pc a new purpose in life?

[Stuart Luppescu <s-luppescu@example.com>]

On 13-Sep-99 John Seebach wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I have an old laptop sitting around, and I'm trying to think of something
> creative and interesting that I can do with it. At the moment, it's doing
> nothing, but it's such a cool design (one of those little IBM butterfly
> thinkpads with the folding keyboard) that I feel like it deserves a better
> fate than gathering dust (well, actually, mold -- this is japan and I have
> no AC) in my closet. I just haven't thought of anything good yet.
> 
> The stats:
> 
> *Intel 486/75
> *24 MB ram
> *360 MB HD
> *NO Cdrom
> *NO Floppy (there's an external drive, but I lost the connecting cable in
> an airport somewhere)
> *Ports: 1 parallel, 1 IRDA (there's a port replicator which adds 9-pin
> RS232, video, and maybe mouse and keyboard, but it's in the USA), Internal
> 14.4 modem 
> *Currently has Win95 installed on it. 
> 
> As I don't have a CDROM, floppy, or a network card for it, I can't figure
> out how to get anything else on there. Getting linux onto this machine
> would definitely be an interesting exercise. The missing floppy would
> certainly add an unusual challenge.
> 
> So, what would YOU do with such a beast, besides use it as a bookend? I'm
> looking for interesting ideas, and open to all suggestions, no matter how
> bizarre.

I have Linux (RedHat 5.2) running on just such a machine, but by the time I
loaded a minimal system, I only have about 20MB left over. It runs fine and I
enjoy using it more than I did when Windows 3.11 was on it. However, I don't
think it's going to be possible to do an install without a floppy.
______________________________________________________________________
Stuart Luppescu         -=-=-  University of Chicago
$(B:MJ8$HCRF`H~$NIc(B        -=-=-  s-luppescu@example.com
http://www.consortium-chicago.org/people/sl/sl.html
ICQ #21172047  AIM: psycho7070
Let him choose out of my files, his projects to accomplish.
                -- Shakespeare, "Coriolanus"
>> Sent on 13-Sep-99 at 09:43:49 with xfmail
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