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Don’t Throw That Old Computer Away!

Written by mike from http://beginlinux.com on November 6th, 2008 | 0 Comments

You can revitalize any old computer by using the new DSL version 4.4.7. This distro will virtually work on any old computer. I will run with as little as 12 MB of RAM. So as far as running on your computer you can figure that it will.

DSL is a powerful and versatile yet extremely small Linux distribution with a lot of potential. This distribution provides an avenue of freedom to those who have been limited by size and age of their computers as DSL works extremely well on older hardware. DSL also provides a system that can work well with mini-itx or modern computers and provide excellent performance and options. Many who are interested in looking at embedded technology are looking at the options that exist with DSL.

Get DSL at EasyLinuxCDs for $1.95

Get the Manual for DSL on PDF

Now a newer option, a bigger option is also available with DSL-N. This DSL derivative goes beyond the 50 MB mark into the 80 MB+ that provides several new options. Besides better more capable and more compatible office products like Mozilla, Mozzila Mail, AbiWord, Gnumeric and MPlayer it also supports the 2.6 kernel.

One of the things that you give up when you have a Linux distribution that is under 50 MB is that the bling or eye candy. The fonts, images and features are basic. But they are certainly functional and you can make a useful tool out of the machine that you have in the closet collecting dust. I took a bunch of thrown away computers and put DSL on them and gave them to students to take home for a homework computer. Every kid in America could have a homework computer if people would give away their old computers instead of dumping them.

You can see here that the text editor and word processing are not OpenOffice 3. But as I said these are function and will get the job done.

One of the useful tools that you will need to learn is the Control Panel. This one interface is used to set up networking, wireless (which works great by the way) do backups and turn on your web server, ftp server or ssh server. Basic but works very well.