Raided the PC Graveyard

McKantis_Mayhem

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THE BREAKDOWN

Soooo...

I was gifted a bunch of old Dells...

20150322_200150.jpg

...and they are as follows:
Dell Dimension 4700 x 4
Dell Optiplex 160L x 2
Dell Optiplex GX280 x 5 (4 of the slim variety you see stacked on top)
Dell Optiplex 320 x 1
Compaq Presario 5r1z15cb x 1

According to the gifter, all 13 of these dinosaurs were fully functional before the HDDs were removed (they were former tax prep computers) and now they are taking up shelf space at my mother's house.


BRAINSTORMING?

So, the question is what to do with them all.

From my brief look inside, I'm fairly certain each is equipped with 2GBs of DDR, at least 1 SATA cable, and most have a Pentium 4 or Celeron D processor.

My friend's initial idea when he originally received them was to play Frankenstein and resell a few with windows 7 installed. Looking at them though, I'm not sure they can handle 7.

The GX280's I've had contact with somewhat recently were BARELY able to keep up with the XP that they had on them, though I'm not sure of their RAM situations at the time.

I love the Slim cases since they flip open, so I may keep those aside and mod the shells. The only problem with that is the cases use a case specific PSU.

Any ideas?
 
If you take the ram from one of the GX280s and put it in another I reckon they could run windows 8 OK. not 7 so much as that can be more intensive. I'm pretty sure they came with either 512 or 1 gb ram depending on spec.
 
Have you been digging about in my shed?? :p

Seriously though, you could mix n match bits up, check whether they are 478 or 775 sockets on them, the 775 socket version if memory serves correctly, handle the low end core 2 duo chips with the bios update, so with that, you could repurpose a couple of them into servers or NAS boxes.
 
I thought they came with a gig too, but the three I opened had either 2×1GB, or 4×512MB. I'm pretty sure they maxed them all out since they were we're for tax preparation.

To make them servers they'd need a minimum of 2TB to be viable, but that's definitely an option. Not sure how the performance will be since I'm pretty sure they're all SATA rev. 1.

I thought about Linux too, but I've only ever managed to install Ubuntu on one machine, and that was years ago, (I think with 10.4). I actually tried to install 14 several times with the H.I.P.S. machine, but the first 2 times the download was buggy, and the next 3 it did install, but for some reason glitches in ways I've never heard of after it was fully installed. Even booting from the disk didn't work, so I gave up and bought a Windows license.

Needless to say, I've got unresolved Linux issues that I need to deal with ^^
 
Wow, that's an awful lot of stuff you need to get rid of.

I wouldn't mind modding the case tbh. I did a Dell a little while back and it was fun, but the hardware in there is all pretty much defunct.
 
Are they, PGA 478 or LGA 775 ?
Because with first option... it's really hard to do anything with it (AGP and DDR1 only + probably not Win 8 compatible).
First thing : Switch EVERY Celeron D CPU, to Pentium 4 (with Hyper Threading if it's possible).
Northwood or Prescott - depends on CPU Support.

On LGA 775 u should be able to at least upgrade CPU's to Pentium D's (NOT PDC's - Pentium Dual-Core's).
Older chipsets like 915, 925, etc. can't/won't suport Conroe-type chips.
 
My thoughts exactly :) P4 "Press hots" FTW :lol: I tried modding a Dimension E520 a while back, damn they really made those cases solid :D Still have one sat here doing nothing.

Yeah the cases are lovely. I used to have to put them together lol they're like coal bunkers :D

Eee, they don't make em like they used to (aspirin and pee).

Amazing how Intel survived through that era. AMD were absolutely battering them.
 
Yeah the cases are lovely. I used to have to put them together lol they're like coal bunkers :D

Eee, they don't make em like they used to (aspirin and pee).

Amazing how Intel survived through that era. AMD were absolutely battering them.
So true, the engineering that went into building those cases was way OTT, but if you ever dropped one it'd break concrete :lol:

I remember going to LAN parties at my local Community Center and everyone had P4s or Celerons and little old me rocking up with an Athlon X2 :) I got ridiculed like crazy but I was the only one there maxing out Unreal Tournament II. :)
 
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