Question Raiders of the Outdated Systems: Chapter II

King_V

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I really started this because of a desire to snag a few more Windows 10 licenses. But, interesting stuff happens.

So, there have been more systems ripe for the picking since my last escapade.

First:
At one point, helping my GF clean stuff out of her mom's house, I discovered a nearly featherweight HP tower, and figured I'd see if there was any data left on it that my GF or her daughter needed that could be pulled. And, of course, I'd shamelessly use the system to grab the license.

There was also a conveniently small HP desktop form-factor PC that HOLY CRAP THIS THING WEIGHS A FREAKING TON!! -- alright, a bit of an exaggeration, but it was obnoxiously heavy.

The two-ton monstrosity turns out to be a Pentium 4 system of some kind with an AGP slot, but the video card was missing. Since I didn't have any AGP cards that I could conveniently use/grab out of a system, I kind of let that one go. I figured at best it probably had XP, or maybe Windows Vista. I did do a scan of the hard drive, but only my GF's daughter had an account on it, and it looked like she got whatever data she needed long ago, as her user directory was pretty much empty. Remember when a 40GB HDD was considered respectable? This heavy monstrosity does!

The featherweight tower was also sans-GPU, but, being somewhat more modern, it had an AGP slot. Fired it up, and lo-and-behold, that old 320GB hard drive revealed that Windows 10 was installed. GF and her daughter had accounts on it... GF couldn't remember hers, but daughter did, and her account was admin and accessible.

Sadly, the Windows 10 install was not registered. Apparently, it was upgraded from an earlier OS, which itself was never registered, so, meh. But, at least we were able to recover data from it, so, bonus!

The system has an Athlon II X4 630, and 2x4GB ram sticks. Motherboard has only 2 RAM slots, and maxes out at 8GB, so, that's where it is. The CPU has a weird sort of downdraft cooler with heatpipes, fairly low profile, but the fan seems to be between the heatsink and the CPU. The fan, however, is seized. Still, with the case open, the heatsink is good enough to prevent the CPU from overheating/shutting down with basic use. The side panel had intake holes, with a plastic pipe attached that went right to the CPU, allowing the CPU cooler to draw fresh air, back when the fan worked.

Ultimately, though, pulled the HDD, backed it up to my NAS for GF and GF's daughter to grab their files at their leisure. Case and optical drive could be useful, though. Maybe someone would want the CPU and/or RAM... but it's a problem for some other day. It also has a Rosewill PSU, plenty for the system it's in, but clearly not the original PSU.



Eventually, I took the heavy monstrosity of a P4 desktop PC to the township's electronics recycling area, along with some other stuff I had to get rid of.

Lo and behold, a Dell tower, which, like the HP from my previous find at that place, still had the plastic film never peeled off from the front panel, and seemed fully intact. HDD, optical drive, CPU, and two sticks of RAM. Plus a label on the front that said Intel Inside, Core i3. PSU has no PCIe connectors, not surprisingly, and is 300W. Side panel says Inspiron.

Tried to boot it, no luck. Two beeps keep repeating. Tried removing the RAM, install 1 stick at a time, and, suddenly it works. The only difference is that the two sticks are swapped.

Like that HP tower I found, the MB is limited to 8GB RAM max. Turns out the CPU is an i3-3240, 1TB HDD, and, it boots to Windows 10. Did a System Reset so I could put myself in as an admin... Windows 10 Home, digital license. Woohoo!

Weirdly, when it's powered on, the smell that comes out is a lot like . . a barber shop?


I know neither of these are powerhouses, but I just think it's cool when "it works and is practically useable as is" happens with these discoveries. Hell, that Ivy Bridge i3, at 2c/4t, certainly will outdo my old Haswell Pentium 2c/2t whose clock is definitely lower than the i3. That Haswell's only advantage is the capability to take 2x8GB RAM, as opposed to the 2x4GB it currently has. But, I'm unlikely to ever actually upgrade it.

Fun times. Though, I'd better sell off or give away a few older systems I have, as my GF is starting to Roll Her Eyes™ in that Very Particular Way™ at this point.
 
I really started this because of a desire to snag a few more Windows 10 licenses. But, interesting stuff happens.

So, there have been more systems ripe for the picking since my last escapade.

First:
At one point, helping my GF clean stuff out of her mom's house, I discovered a nearly featherweight HP tower, and figured I'd see if there was any data left on it that my GF or her daughter needed that could be pulled. And, of course, I'd shamelessly use the system to grab the license.

There was also a conveniently small HP desktop form-factor PC that HOLY CRAP THIS THING WEIGHS A FREAKING TON!! -- alright, a bit of an exaggeration, but it was obnoxiously heavy.

The two-ton monstrosity turns out to be a Pentium 4 system of some kind with an AGP slot, but the video card was missing. Since I didn't have any AGP cards that I could conveniently use/grab out of a system, I kind of let that one go. I figured at best it probably had XP, or maybe Windows Vista. I did do a scan of the hard drive, but only my GF's daughter had an account on it, and it looked like she got whatever data she needed long ago, as her user directory was pretty much empty. Remember when a 40GB HDD was considered respectable? This heavy monstrosity does!

The featherweight tower was also sans-GPU, but, being somewhat more modern, it had an AGP slot. Fired it up, and lo-and-behold, that old 320GB hard drive revealed that Windows 10 was installed. GF and her daughter had accounts on it... GF couldn't remember hers, but daughter did, and her account was admin and accessible.

Sadly, the Windows 10 install was not registered. Apparently, it was upgraded from an earlier OS, which itself was never registered, so, meh. But, at least we were able to recover data from it, so, bonus!

The system has an Athlon II X4 630, and 2x4GB ram sticks. Motherboard has only 2 RAM slots, and maxes out at 8GB, so, that's where it is. The CPU has a weird sort of downdraft cooler with heatpipes, fairly low profile, but the fan seems to be between the heatsink and the CPU. The fan, however, is seized. Still, with the case open, the heatsink is good enough to prevent the CPU from overheating/shutting down with basic use. The side panel had intake holes, with a plastic pipe attached that went right to the CPU, allowing the CPU cooler to draw fresh air, back when the fan worked.

Ultimately, though, pulled the HDD, backed it up to my NAS for GF and GF's daughter to grab their files at their leisure. Case and optical drive could be useful, though. Maybe someone would want the CPU and/or RAM... but it's a problem for some other day. It also has a Rosewill PSU, plenty for the system it's in, but clearly not the original PSU.



Eventually, I took the heavy monstrosity of a P4 desktop PC to the township's electronics recycling area, along with some other stuff I had to get rid of.

Lo and behold, a Dell tower, which, like the HP from my previous find at that place, still had the plastic film never peeled off from the front panel, and seemed fully intact. HDD, optical drive, CPU, and two sticks of RAM. Plus a label on the front that said Intel Inside, Core i3. PSU has no PCIe connectors, not surprisingly, and is 300W. Side panel says Inspiron.

Tried to boot it, no luck. Two beeps keep repeating. Tried removing the RAM, install 1 stick at a time, and, suddenly it works. The only difference is that the two sticks are swapped.

Like that HP tower I found, the MB is limited to 8GB RAM max. Turns out the CPU is an i3-3240, 1TB HDD, and, it boots to Windows 10. Did a System Reset so I could put myself in as an admin... Windows 10 Home, digital license. Woohoo!

Weirdly, when it's powered on, the smell that comes out is a lot like . . a barber shop?


I know neither of these are powerhouses, but I just think it's cool when "it works and is practically useable as is" happens with these discoveries. Hell, that Ivy Bridge i3, at 2c/4t, certainly will outdo my old Haswell Pentium 2c/2t whose clock is definitely lower than the i3. That Haswell's only advantage is the capability to take 2x8GB RAM, as opposed to the 2x4GB it currently has. But, I'm unlikely to ever actually upgrade it.

Fun times. Though, I'd better sell off or give away a few older systems I have, as my GF is starting to Roll Her Eyes™ in that Very Particular Way™ at this point.

Hey King_V,

I love making use of my older machines (that I don't sell on) Good for making some bits work together and resurrect. It's always a trip down memory lane :)

I'm currently running a 5 year old Dell Latitude 7280 for a Plex server with USB hub. It's a stellar little yoke. Runs like a dream with Win 10 and is still very snappy. I5 7500u. It's only a 12in screen, but it makes ultra portable. I often bring it with me on little journeys :)

It is surprising how some tech, particularly CPU's can run for years on end.

On a little bit of a side note, just today, I was cleaning out my Mam's shed. I came across a JVC MX-D302T Compact Component System (AKA - Big Bass Stereo). It had been in the shed about 20 years. I though to myself, 'I'm gonna resurrect this thing'

Anyway, long story short, I fired it up after a couple of days dry out, and it worked!! The system, the speakers, covered in gank. Couldn't believe it. Our tech really does live on!
 
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King_V

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Nice! Kinda reminds me of how shockingly trouble-free it was to get my old Atari 2600 running. Bought in 1981 I think (I believe I was in 4th grade), and had been sitting in a basement for about 20 years before I resurrected it.

There's still some grungy/funkiness on it, but other than having to clean the contacts a little on a few cartridges, everything just worked. Fortunately my TV has a coax input. Weird seeing it on a 60 inch screen, though!
 

Kona45primo

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Jan 16, 2021
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Lol just went through some old PC's at my parents house. Didn't bother powering but

1 pentium 4 with a side mounted cooler master.
1 old AMD
And my college pc AMD 4000+ with a Zalman 9000? with a 6800gs and aftermaret accelero cooler... Pretty rad for back in the day, lol. Still have the LCD Uguru display from the Abit AV8-3rd Eye motherboard.
 
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Well, you never know until you try...

coughcough not that I'm trying to be a bad influence or anything coughcough
I had several Atari products including consoles before and after this one, 1040ST modified with HDDs and adapter for Mac for dual BOOT and adapter to VGA monitor well into 386 era. This one got lost in attic in some boxes somehow and discovered by accident . just couple of years ago. I was getting rid of and sending for recycling dozens of old and dead MBs, GPUs and such I changed for others during years, so I run into this one together with it's mono monitor so decided to keep it as it was still working. There's still alot of games and SW for it out there, just need to get a floppy drive with USB.