[HN Gopher] If you're happy with OpenBSD, probably any computer ...
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If you're happy with OpenBSD, probably any computer is good enough
Author : BizarreByte
Score : 217 points
Date : 2023-02-05 16:42 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (muezza.ca)
(TXT) w3m dump (muezza.ca)
| gorgoiler wrote:
| That's a fine piece of hardware and a fine OS to run on it. I
| would feel a bit hampered without a good browser though. So much
| of my work involves trawling GitHub for bug reports and stack
| overflow for bug mitigations. Very little modern software
| development, for me at least, happens in isolation. There's a
| third-party dependency or two in almost everything I do.
|
| I try to use w3m a lot for that stuff. Many sites still have a
| cheeseburger menu made out of a tree of <ul> lists up the top of
| the page, and require CSS indentation or borders to render
| discussions nicely. Are there terminal browsers that support
| these features better?
| johnklos wrote:
| There are lots of people in the comments here who appear to not
| get it. This isn't about replacing a contemporary computer with
| something old. It's about the usability of a decent OS on very
| modest hardware.
|
| One of the systems on which I run NetBSD is a 33 MHz m68030 Mac
| LC III+ (http://elsie.zia.io - it's hosting a site about an LC
| II, which I'm still working on). It's quite useful to see how
| assumptions people make about "acceptable" performance
| regressions bear out in the real world. Sure, not much can be
| done about taking six or seven minutes to ssh, but when bad
| coding causes a shell script to take twice as long, it's much
| more obvious on hardware like this than on a modern Ryzen system.
|
| Nobody is telling others to forego your modern computer and your
| Windows needs. It's just interesting to some of us that we can
| still run modern things on very modest and, in some cases, very
| non-mainstream hardware in 2023.
| BizarreByte wrote:
| Thank you for getting it, this was my entire point and I'm glad
| it came across to someone.
|
| Obviously I would never suggest someone replace their modern
| daily driver computer with one of this age.
| mro_name wrote:
| indeed, developing fast software requires slow hardware.
| flenserboy wrote:
| Excellent point. Software _testing_ (not for stability but
| instead for usability, and certainly not for _compiling_ ,
| lol) ought to be done on minimal-spec systems (the specs of
| which might possibly be dialed-down further once optimization
| is done, which would be a bonus). Assuming that a faster
| system (or one with more RAM or storage) will cure the real
| problem has allowed all sorts of sloppiness to creep into
| software.
| Sesse__ wrote:
| It does not. Slow hardware _can_ give you a certain amount of
| _motivation_ for speeding up your software, but this is by no
| means a given (if software running slowly on your own
| computer automatically made you optimize it, there would not
| be software that is really slow even on fast hardware, and
| there clearly is).
|
| If you care about making software fast, you invest time in
| the measurements-ideas-measurements loop, where having fast
| hardware helps a lot (it allows you get measurements faster,
| and try out more ideas in a given time frame). Since any sane
| measurement is based on benchmarking and not eyeballing,
| slower CPUs don't help you. And you certainly can care about
| fast software without having a slow computer personally.
| asveikau wrote:
| How about the fact that performance best practices vary on
| different hardware?
|
| CPUs have changed a lot, in that caches, speculative
| execution, and parallelism are the way to get performance,
| and that was not true in the heyday of a classic Mac.
|
| I'm still in favor of porting to old platforms for various
| reasons. But we need to keep in mind that performance
| optimization is not one size fits all.
| andai wrote:
| >if software running slowly on your own computer
| automatically made you optimize it
|
| I recently changed 1 byte in Chrome.dll and decreased the
| lag for copying large images by a factor of 2-3. (The UI
| freezes for 5-10 seconds. Turns out it's re-encoding a 2MB
| JPG into a 20MB PNG for the clipboard, at compression level
| 6 no less!)
|
| I put up with it for years thinking there was nothing I
| could do, but one day I decided to ask some people smarter
| than me, and they gave me enough info to track down the
| code in IDA (I had never used it before).
|
| My point is, motivation is a powerful thing!
|
| (Offtopic but turns out Firefox copies the original file,
| so you can paste it right into Windows explorer--blew my
| mind!)
| alexchantavy wrote:
| This sounds cool, you should write a blog on it
| drewcoo wrote:
| I think any article on HN is really just a jumping off point
| for people to talk about themselves. Everyone's had old
| computers, so that's easier to talk about.
| pdimitar wrote:
| The problem with arguments like these is to me two-fold:
|
| 1. Physical space. Most of the older tech takes too much space. I
| don't live in a mansion and I have no dedicated rooms just for
| big bulky computers.
|
| 2. Power consumption, heat, noise. I would love to be less
| consumerist and use stuff from 15 years ago and stop feeding
| greedy corporations but... the old stuff consumes 90 to 200
| watts, heats up easily and noticeably, and can get loud.
|
| Both parts of this problem are trivially solved by modern tech. I
| got a 13" Chinese fanless laptop second hand for 160 euro; it has
| a Celeron J CPU with 12GB RAM and 256GB SATA SSD. It can do
| anything I need that's not programming or rendering -- including
| playing 60FPS video -- and last time I checked it, it consumed
| 30W under full load (all CPU cores at 100%) and idled at 11W or
| so.
|
| Modern tech is not only about its buyers being mindless
| consumerist drones. It offers tangible benefits, including long-
| term environmental sustainability.
|
| Yes a lot of CO2 was likely released due to its production but
| I'd wager that tech that heats up less and uses less power can
| last 10-13 years and will pay off its environmental footprint
| with a generous interest on top.
|
| So unless you're a retro collector or want to write compilers for
| older CPUs, there are zero reasons to be excited about older
| computers.
|
| _(That being said, if somebody finally creates a modern 6502 CPU
| computer e.g. in the shape of a 10 " netbook I'll buy it
| immediately, provided I can also program it through USB from my
| workstation.)_
| hedora wrote:
| This. The thing I dislike the most about openbsd is the lack of
| modern, supported hardware.
|
| One notable exception is the PC Engines APU 2, though that's
| stretching the definition of modern.
|
| Seriously: Pick a laptop SKU that is still being manufactured
| and has similar ergonomics to a MacBook Pro or classic thinkpad
| (centered keyboard + trackpad, 4K screen, all the other bits in
| the right spots, reasonably quiet, 8 hour real world battery),
| and mark it up by $200. Sell it from a site that OpenBSD links
| to.
|
| Make sure the manufacturer agrees to build that exact laptop
| for at least 5 years. (Moore's law is dead, after all.)
|
| Have the project test 100% of the hardware devices in that
| laptop on each point release, and donate the $200 markup to the
| project.
| dman wrote:
| Thinkpad X1 is a phenomenal device to run OpenBSD on. The
| last couple of times I tried it, things worked out of the box
| perfectly.
| busterarm wrote:
| The biggest things that OpenBSD doesn't support (well) are
| Bluetooth, some wifi cards and TPM modules. And you can
| literally fix all of these issues with a supported USB
| device. Been running OpenBSD on multiple generations of
| Thinkpad laptops without issue. Using the Protectli 6 port
| device as an OpenBSD router (Intel NICs are well-supported).
| prmoustache wrote:
| Add to that bluetooth is generally a mess. The only thing
| where it is vaguely useful is for audio and I believe you
| can still use a bluetooth audio transceiver such as the
| Creative BT-W3 that present itself as a usb audio interface
| to the OS if you really want to connect those audio
| headphones of yours.
| peatmoss wrote:
| My desktop is a new-ish AMD CPU, brand-new intel wifi, brand
| new AMD GPU computer, and I didn't so much as think about
| anything related to compatibility with OpenBSD. For laptops,
| I'd assume the Framework laptop works without issue? Hard to
| compete with Apple on portables for sure, but anything but
| macOS is a WIP there.
|
| For me the thing that keeps me from running OpenBSD 100% of
| the time is my Steam library, but I'm considering demoting my
| PC to a living room gaming device and handling my modest
| desktop computing needs via something small and fanless
| running OpenBSD.
| refuse wrote:
| I really want to see something like this. I'd honestly be
| happy with something like a RaspPi with an SSD and a huge
| battery in a laptop with good build quality. My system reqs
| are really low; a laptop that would survive 20 years with
| regular use would be fantastic.
| johnklos wrote:
| The Pinebook Pro is well supported by NetBSD (not sure
| about OpenBSD), and it can take eMMC, at least. It's quite
| affordable, battery life is excellent, and my Pinebook
| feels pretty rugged. It has a six core RK3399 and 4 gigs of
| memory. I don't think you can get a better laptop for the
| price ($220 US).
| 1over137 wrote:
| >the old stuff consumes 90 to 200 watts, heats up easily and
| noticeably
|
| Which is great when it's -30 outside, like today. :)
| josephcsible wrote:
| Even then it's not really great. If your goal with electric
| power is heating, heat pumps are a much more efficient way to
| do so.
| reisse wrote:
| Not when it's -30 outside.
| girvo wrote:
| Sadly where I live it never really gets below 15 degrees C,
| and is normally around or above 30C for most of the year, so
| computers heating up my office is a real problem.
| karteum wrote:
| > It offers tangible benefits
|
| Yes, you listed them and they are valid, except
|
| > including long-term environmental sustainability
|
| Err... no not really ! The environmental impact of pretty much
| all consumer electronics is by (very) far dominated by the
| impact of its manufacturing (mining, water for manufacturing
| the chips, oil for transport, robots for assembly in countries
| where electricity is made with coal, etc), therefore anyone
| trying to be serious about "environmental sustainability"
| understands that it mostly implies to extend as much as
| possible existing equipment and avoid buying new ones (even if
| the old ones are bulky, noisy and consume a lot of electricity
| compared to the new)
| [deleted]
| doublepg23 wrote:
| I think there's something to be said for the fundamentals of
| modern computers too. A 4K screen, excellent keyboard, blazing
| fast NVMe, etc are all attainable on a budget now with CPUs
| using less power, as you said.
| II2II wrote:
| It depends.
|
| My desktop PC, which is over a decade old, performs fine under
| current releases of Linux and Windows. My laptop PC is a bit
| over two years old. Performance is lacklustre under the current
| release of Windows. Newer isn't always better, particularly
| when you're comparing laptops to desktops. I also doubt that
| many laptops would have an equivalent lifespan to a desktop.
| They have more perilous lives due to their portability and
| portability means they are frequently built with more compact
| and less robust components. That is especially true when you
| consider that laptops are more difficult to repair (due to more
| integration and more difficult to obtain parts).
|
| Granted, the iMac G4 is in a different league since it is a 20
| year old machine that was produced when performance jumps were
| more meaningful. I can see it being a useful machine for
| someone who has limited interest and use for computers or
| simply wants something disconnected to get work done. I took
| the latter approach in the early 2000's and it worked quite
| well. (The fastest machine I had was a 68040, and I did run
| NetBSD on it.)
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| I agree with general gist of your laptop vs desktop argument.
| I will add though that there exist laptops that are / were
| built to last ; I am nowhere _near_ the ThinkPad fanatic some
| people are :-) but I still have several t420s laptops, 11-12
| years old I think, running as daily drivers with windows 10.
| That 's about as long or longer as any desktop I've owner
| particularly considering how little I've changed it (mainly
| adding an ssd).
| Sakos wrote:
| T420 would be perfect if it wasn't for the god awful
| displays manufacturers used. I'd still be using mine
| otherwise. Just going from a 1080p monitor back to it was a
| pain. After using my M1 MBP und my 4k monitor for the past
| year, I could never go back.
| andai wrote:
| Not sure about this model but I modded an X230 with a
| better display for $100. Surprisingly easy, it pops right
| open.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| T420s is the smaller version of t420; still modular and
| much more portable.
|
| There were likely several versions of lcd panels with it
| - the t420s's I got were way better than the t480 and
| e580 I picked up recently, even though there's 6 years
| between them. I believe the ones I have are either 1920 x
| 1080 or 1600 x 900 (whereas the t480 is inexplicably only
| 1366 x 768 ; and e580 is 1080p but awful contrast or
| gamma or something)
| pdimitar wrote:
| Yeah, I don't disagree. My gaming PC is 11 years old and I
| have zero complaints; the only thing I ever had to do for it
| was change the GPU 6-7 years ago. It has been rock-solid
| otherwise.
|
| But again, power consumption.
|
| And I'll grand you that it's possible that this Chinese
| laptop I got will have its logic board burn long before the
| 10 year mark. Sadly that's likely, yes. But as mentioned,
| when I am not programming or doing anything that requires
| more CPU power, it performs perfectly for what I need, and I
| feel better knowing it consumes ~17W on average.
|
| There are likely sweet spots e.g. get a Ryzen R1000 or V1000
| mini PC and stuff it with 2x NVMe and 2x SATA SSDs and have
| it drive 2-4 displays at home. The displays will likely
| consume 20x the power of the machine itself (lol), and that
| machine is very likely to last for a long, long time.
|
| For my needs however a Chinese laptop that costed me 160 EUR
| and has proven it can last anywhere from 7 to 11 hours, is
| perfect. (Though I'll get pissed if it lasts less than 5-6
| years for sure.)
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| How/where did you purchase the Chinese laptop? Does it have a
| name?
|
| Most stuff I can buy is overpriced branded crap
| goosedragons wrote:
| My guess is AliExpress or a site like BangGood. You can also
| find some lurking around Amazon.
| pdimitar wrote:
| Yep, from AliExpress indeed.
| pdimitar wrote:
| https://www.chuwi.com/product/items/Chuwi-GemiBook.html
|
| The guy bought it from AliExpress. Since then I bought a
| bunch of electronics from there and was always satisfied.
|
| And Chuwi have official store there btw.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| vondur wrote:
| I checked and it looks like the PowerPC's were power efficient.
| The 667Mhz model usually ran around 14W up to a maximum of 19W.
| The G5 processors were known to be hot and needed a lot of
| power. I remember having a PowerBook with a G4 back then, and
| remember closing the lid without shutting it down, and coming
| back days later with only a few percent's of battery draw. Of
| course, performance wise, the Intel mobile CPU's at the time
| were starting to really pull ahead of the mobile PowerPC chips
| at the point, except for a few very specific workloads.
| pdimitar wrote:
| Seems I thought of the G5 indeed, thanks for the correction!
| hirako2000 wrote:
| I took your concerns to some extreme. Idle at 4 watts, about 10
| watts maxing the 4 cores. 88 dollars. Keyboard excluded.
|
| https://streamable.com/roro2y
| pdimitar wrote:
| lol. :D
|
| Appreciate the dedication!
| rakoo wrote:
| In digital, pollution happens during construction way more than
| usage. It still makes sense to use a decade-old computer.
|
| The second-hand market is filled with material that was built
| at same point; you having access to your nice second hand
| laptop is due to newer laptops being built all the time. It is
| still sending a signal upstream that such a computer can be
| sold.
|
| I do agree that buying second hand is much better than buying
| new, but not even buying is still better here
| horsawlarway wrote:
| > It still makes sense to use a decade-old computer.
|
| I don't really think it does, at least not some of them.
|
| A lot of those older machines are just running really, really
| high idle power draw. Ex: Pentium 4/5, Core 2 Duo, Athlon64,
| etc. Running from 40 to 100 watts idle.
|
| For comparison, a new RPI will go as low as ~1-3 watt idle,
| tops out at ~5-7 watts under full load, and will generally
| have better performance characteristics.
|
| I run a lot of old machines in my basement because it _can_
| make sense (I throw them in a k8s farm), but I also generally
| have them spend a week on an electricity meter first
| (honestly, just a function of the UPS I run down there) and
| anything drawing more than 20 watts idle gets sent to the
| recycling instead.
|
| The bad ones tend to run high + hot + loud, and they
| absolutely aren't worth it.
| rakoo wrote:
| Yep, I was talking about the environmental argument, where
| drawing 40W idle might not be that bad compared to what
| happened at construction. Especially when you can source
| electricity from low-impact sources.
| pdimitar wrote:
| Can you link to your UPS? I'm on the lookout for a good one
| that doesn't make a lot of noise and has a built-in watt-
| meter for each of its sockets.
| horsawlarway wrote:
| Sadly mine is not per-socket. I have an old APC that
| shows load in watts for the sockets under battery backup,
| and also load in watts for the entire load (it's split
| and offers overdraw protection to everything, but battery
| backup only to half the sockets on the back).
|
| Usually I just leave the new machine as the only thing
| idling on the sockets without battery backup and compare
| the two.
|
| I also have one of these (https://www.amazon.com/gp/produ
| ct/B08LD53F3P/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b...) floating around, but
| you have to be careful with it since it's not a surge
| protector. That said, it's cheap and will monitor each
| socket individually.
| primis wrote:
| A decade ago was 2013, the pentium 4 is at least 13 years
| old now, but entered production 23 years ago. There's still
| a lot of utility to be had from a 10 year old machine. My
| daily driver laptop os a lenovo t420 which came out in
| 2011. Sure it can't play games but it'll do fine with
| youtube, programming, etc.
|
| My server box is also a 2012 era machine, it's a 3770k
| build. It's perfectly fine for what I use it for. Yeah it
| takes a bit more power than a modern intel chip, but it
| sure beats the alternative of throwing it in a landfill to
| save a few watts at idle.
| horsawlarway wrote:
| If you have a need and you already own it - knock
| yourself out.
|
| But comparing spending 40 bucks on craigslist or ebay for
| an old pentium/core 2 duo, vs getting an rpi... You're
| probably better off with the Pi (assuming you can source
| it, which is not a given atm).
|
| I don't even buy most of mine used, I just get hand-me-
| downs from friends/family because they want to get rid of
| the machine and ask me to wipe the drive in exchange for
| the hardware, but even at an upfront cost of free, a
| machine using 100 watts over a year is 80 bucks in my
| region, and my power is right around the US average.
|
| Plus power in my region is tiered, so the first 650kwh
| per month are cheap, the next 350 are avg, and the rest
| are expensive. So adding machines at this point is
| actually closer to ~$130 a year at 100 watts idle (paying
| for t3 rates).
|
| Personally, it's just not worth it to me to take a
| freebie that runs me $100+ in costs a year. Not even
| accounting for the knock-on costs, like the extra AC
| needed because 100 watts is a small heater.
|
| ----
|
| So sure - lots of older machines do just fine (the end of
| the core 2 duo line is quite reasonable, and most laptops
| are actually fine) but it's really probably worth
| measuring the power draw.
|
| The five year cost of operating that rpi is ~$30, the
| five year cost of operating a 100 watt machine are ~$450.
| And I can run a LOT more low power machines and stay in
| my t1/t2 pricing for power.
| rrdharan wrote:
| > It still makes sense to use a decade-old computer.
|
| Economically the incentives are not aligned this way though,
| if you pay for grid power... you still have to pay for the
| electricity, and there's also the opportunity cost of that
| payment (e.g. you could spend the money you save on your
| electric bill on carbon credits or green charities or
| whatever).
| rakoo wrote:
| It might make less economical sense, true, but if reducing
| pollution or environmental impact made economic sense we
| wouldn't even be talking about it.
|
| Economic sense is not always relevant. I might even argue
| that economic sense is at odds with environmental sense
| pdimitar wrote:
| I agree that extra pollution comes from manufacturing and
| said as much in my post already.
|
| But I believe the fact that this laptop can last at least 10
| years + it will consume a single order of magnitude less
| power over these 10 years adds up to more environment care.
|
| The production is already completed. The damage has been
| done. Let's use the machines at least because they are 10x
| more efficient and we can slow down the environmental damage.
|
| Also to many of us outright not buying machines means we
| gotta switch industry. And a lot of us don't want to.
|
| > _It is still sending a signal upstream that such a computer
| can be sold._
|
| That's a bit out there though; it only signals the vendor
| that people hold on to their older machines for longer time.
| If anything, the laptop I got second-hand is no longer even
| listed on the vendor's AliExpress store. It only has a
| marketing page on the website and you can only find it
| second-hand or here and there on the internet.
| rakoo wrote:
| I think we need to take a step back and see the big
| picture. There are 10-year olds computers sitting unused;
| as a whole, it can fill a percentage of usages.
|
| If it does then the people using them don't need to buy
| another one, new or refurbished. If they don't need to buy,
| other people can't sell as easily. If they can't sell as
| easily, they might use it longer, and not need/want to buy
| another one, old or refurbished, etc...
|
| It's a whole market and if constructors see that the
| overall tendency is of using longer, they will get the
| signal that there can be less sales overall. And thus build
| less.
|
| Everything we do is part of a larger system, and I believe
| we should understand what the system is like and how it
| works if we want to have a real impact.
| pdimitar wrote:
| I believe many of us are aware of the bigger picture
| outlined by you, but you keep ignoring the point that the
| previous 10-year old computers burn much more
| electricity. And as I already said, the newer more
| efficient machines have been built already so we might as
| well use them and help the planet by using less watts.
|
| The process you describe is yet to happen e.g. the
| computers I have I don't want to replace unless they
| crash and burn. So in 5-ish years I believe vendors will
| slow down manufacturing indeed because many people do
| like I do: they get the newer more power-efficient stuff
| and then hold on to it for longer periods.
| rakoo wrote:
| Oh I'm well aware that newer machines use less
| electricity and that's good; it's just not necessarily
| true that, looking at the entire lifecycle, it is better
| for the planet compared to taking your older computer out
| of the closet.
|
| Again, I'm not saying what you're doing is bad, if
| everyone could fulfill their digital needs and wants out
| of second hand, that'd be awesome. I only wanted to point
| out that using less electricity isn't automatically
| better.
| pdimitar wrote:
| I agree. It's not automatically better.
|
| It's a balancing act between what we need to get our jobs
| done, what are our ergonomic preferences -- I have the
| so-called "lap desk" (basically two parallelepiped-shaped
| pillows and a well-designed plate with USB extensions to
| put on top of them) where I like to work on the couch or
| the bed -- and what is kinda sorta good for the planet.
|
| I can't hyper-optimize only for the planet. I am doing my
| best but obviously everyone else has to help a little bit
| as well.
|
| Thanks for entertaining this discussion, it was
| interesting.
| oriolid wrote:
| I'm not completely convinced. The early PCs didn't need
| heat sinks or fans other than the 80mm PSU fan. They were
| inefficient, but the total power wasn't that huge. Even
| for newer computers, I have a Raspberry Pi 2 that draws 3
| watts at maximum load and less when idle. It's powerful
| enough for what it does and even with this energy crisis
| it would need to run for years before the energy savings
| would cover the cost of a new model.
| pdimitar wrote:
| Yep, it's not a super clear win. But I was talking about
| the old desktop or all-in-one machines. They still draw a
| bit more but you're also right that the amortized cost
| blurs things. But since I plan on using the refurbished
| modern machines that I got, for years, maybe the equation
| will be in my favor... eventually. :)
| wsc981 wrote:
| I wonder if the same is true for a -say- G3 based laptop
| or desktop. Apple's laptops would often be usable much
| longer on batteries compared to its Wintel counterparts.
| darkwater wrote:
| I recently literally took out of a drawer my old Sony
| Vaio laptop bought in 2011 and converted to a home
| server, replacing a RPI4 whose SD card just died (I used
| it for home automation). Well, the performance upgrade
| has been astonishing for me, probably it was due to the
| SD vs the SSD in the Vaio but I'm not going back. I'm
| actually thinking about self-hosting much more now!
| ghaff wrote:
| I still use a 2015 MacBook Pro daily. (Also have an Apple
| Silicon MacBook but I keep the Intel-based one downstairs
| and pretty much just use it as a web browser.) It's had its
| battery replaced (and the screen replaced under warranty
| for a defect) but it's just fine for my needs.
|
| The power issue is more with large desktop systems. I was
| setting up a moderately old but fairly hefty system as a
| file server. Couldn't get it working--which I discovered
| belatedly was an issue related to my network switch--so I
| bought an unpopulated Synology box. But, given power
| consumption, I also realized that was probably the more
| cost-effective thing to do anyway.
| Glyptodon wrote:
| The sad thing that trips me up is that I can easily run out of
| memory web browsing on most machines w/ less than 16gb just by
| forgetting to close tabs. But my desktop is has a CPU from over a
| decade ago and I don't really foresee needing a new one soon.
| irusensei wrote:
| I wish it had something like jails/lxc and a modern file system
| like ZFS or BTRFS.
| steponlego wrote:
| They recently upgraded FFS for 64-bit. I think they have the
| right philosophy, these FS's you mention are FAAATTTTT and
| would probably at least double to size of the tree. You can
| always set up a NAS with ZFS and simply use it with NFS.
| jamesgill wrote:
| A side note: I love this website. It makes me nostalgic for the
| early-mid 90s when web pages were basic, personal, and mostly
| text.
| shp0ngle wrote:
| I tried to get into Gemini for a while - it's like Gopher but
| reimagined with some more modern ideas.
|
| However I quickly figured out there is not much to actually do
| there. The way modern web works is horrible (I don't want to
| click just another cookie banner thanks), but at least it's
| easy for all people to contribute.
| steponlego wrote:
| Typing this on my T420 running OpenBSD. It does everything I
| really need it to do. I don't play (new) games, and I have a more
| powerful server tucked away here in case I have any CPU-intensive
| jobs I need done.
|
| Honestly after seeing the absolute state of Linux on the desktop
| over the last decade, there is no reason for me to even consider
| it any more.
| tambourine_man wrote:
| Something that aged poorly are browsers. Can you run contemporary
| Chromium, Firefox, WebKit decently on a 800mhz G4?
|
| And I doubt it could handle more than a few open tabs with 512MB
| of RAM.
|
| Most everything else I use computers for have been fast enough
| for 20 years or so.
| thedriver wrote:
| Even something like Debian with the Mate DE can be pretty
| lightweight. Modern web crap is really the biggest resource hog
| for most users.
| prmoustache wrote:
| Netsurf works well on low spec and render most pages well
| enough. Also, switching to lite or mobile versions of websites
| when they exist render them much lighter and more readable.
| adrianmsmith wrote:
| Last time I used a computer with 1GB RAM was in 2014, with
| 32-bit Windows XP. The computer had 512MB in use after startup
| and could only handle 2-3 tabs in the Chrome of the time,
| everything (e.g. Gmail at the time) seemed to use about 100MB.
|
| So 2014 Chrome with webapps like 2014 Gmail wasn't really
| practical on 1GB. So I very much doubt that 2023 Chrome with
| 2023 webapps would be practical on 512MB RAM.
| [deleted]
| amatecha wrote:
| Yeah, I was running Firefox on my iMac G4 with OpenBSD. It was
| being killed frequently though by hitting the memory limit
| (which at the time I didn't know how to raise). I'm intending
| to go back and try again with my deeper knowledge of the OS. I
| have MANY old machines which could benefit from having a
| latest-features OS to use.
| meindnoch wrote:
| The proliferation of browser-based crap was a godsend for
| hardware manufacturers.
| lizknope wrote:
| I've got a MacBookAir4,1 from 2011. I leave it at my parents
| house and use it once a week. It runs the current Fedora 37
| version and it is perfectly fine for web browsing and video. The
| only reason I replaced it was because I wanted a higher
| resolution screen.
|
| While the PPC is probably too old for me even this 11 year old
| machine is still fine for me.
| syntex wrote:
| The power usage is a serious issue, I recently scrapped an old
| PC. It was perfectly fine and usable, but I found it draws with
| graphics card more than 200W. And taking into account how much
| electricity rose in Europe it's super expensive to run. And the
| new one it's 15 times less. So let's take care at least a bit
| about the environment.
| doubled112 wrote:
| > take care at least a bit about the environment
|
| I always take time to consider where the balance point is
| between replacing working, but less efficient equipment with
| newer, more efficient equipment.
|
| It took materials and energy to produce the old one. I know
| electricity is expensive some places, but even then, sometimes
| the break even point is years in the future.
|
| Despite all of this, I only realize its more complicated than I
| hope.
| ibz wrote:
| > let's take care at least a bit about the environment
|
| You know that _producing_ that PC used way more energy than it
| would consume if you left it running?
|
| > taking into account how much electricity rose in Europe
|
| _This_ seems like your main reason actually. Your wallet, not
| the environment. If the energy prices went down, you would have
| kept the old PC around rather than having it end up in a
| landfill or shipped to a poor country where people literally
| burn the PCBs to recover tiny bits of rare metals.
| verytrivial wrote:
| I love the _idea_ of OpenBSD but have only had a couple of sad
| reintroductions over the years and never spent the time
| apparently required to "get it just right" before needing to get
| something else done.
|
| It feels like a base install leaves you in several hours of
| configuration debt, and I apparently don't have the concentration
| span to dig my way out to somewhere interesting and not just half
| way back to productive on the systems I already use.
|
| My newest computer is from 2014 for reference, oldest from around
| 2008 and I emulate older stuff.
|
| I know I'm "doing it wrong" and perhaps it isn't a right fit for
| everyone but ... That's how it is.
| gnubison wrote:
| What configuration debt does OpenBSD bring to your mind?
| zozbot234 wrote:
| There's not much that's specific to OpenBSD wrt. this post, or to
| the G4. The RAM use (61MiB) is roughly in line with a super
| lightweight Linux install for any 32 bit system (requirements for
| a modern 64 bit system tend to be higher). So any computer really
| is good enough _if_ it fits your end use, otherwise it 's no
| good.
| anthk wrote:
| The blog's author might like this dillo fork. It needs autoconf,
| automake, gmake, mbedtls and ftlk.
|
| https://github.com/w00fpack/dilloNG
|
| Mpv it's recommended, at it has a context menu to play videos
| with it and the help of youtube-dl or yt-dlp. A config for it:
|
| ~/.config/mpv/config ytdl-
| format="bestvideo[height<=?420]+bestaudio[height<=?420]"
| vo=xv,drm audio-pitch-correction=no quiet=yes
| pause=no vd-lavc-skiploopfilter=all
|
| Also, for X.Org, you can set the config for the ATI driver so it
| loads the DRI2 drivers among the EXA rendering module.
|
| /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-ati.conf Section
| "Device" Identifier "ati" Driver "ati"
| Option "AccelMethod" "EXA" Option "DRI" "2"
|
| EndSection
| steponlego wrote:
| Any advice on how to get Intel 855 working with Mesa? X.org had
| an update and they removed or deprecated the engine it used.
| Thanks.
| doublepg23 wrote:
| I have plenty of criticisms of OpenBSD but that wide array of
| support is why I end up running it on hobby systems. I've got a
| Lemote netbook (which uses a homegrown Chinese MIPS chip) and a
| PPC Mac of similar vintage in the post. It is really cool to boot
| up these oddball systems and use familiar programs on them.
| squarefoot wrote:
| I totally understand the nostalgia value, but energy doesn't grow
| on trees. A small mini-PC would consume a fraction of the current
| needed to run those old machines, offering much more computing
| power in return. Not to talk about the much better scaling
| achieved by modern processors; some iMac models would _idle_ at
| almost 100 Watts.
| BizarreByte wrote:
| I'm not suggesting one should use a setup like this daily,
| mostly commenting on how good the experience still is when
| running *BSD on it.
|
| At the end of the day if all you need is a computer, it's nice
| to know that basically any computer can still be serviceable.
| In a world where you can get 4k series i5s in the trash though,
| I don't actually think anyone will be using such an old Mac
| seriously.
| ornornor wrote:
| Seriously, you should see the hardware companies are throwing
| away right now... i5/7 6xxx computers and up... what a waste.
| They're fully functional but they've been amortized so thrown
| away to the landfill and replaced with todays model to be
| thrown away in 3-4 years.
|
| What an incredible waste.
| amatecha wrote:
| Ohh.. I've always wondered how to get my hands on this
| "garbage". The machine I use every day is from like 2013...
| the fastest PC I own has a processor that was launched in
| 2014. It's partly because I'm frugal and partly because I
| don't believe in constantly replacing hardware that works
| just fine. But it sounds like by this point companies are
| throwing away stuff far newer than what I use! haha
| voltagex_ wrote:
| Depending on where you are, there'll either be local
| auctions of surplus tech, or eBay / refurbishing stores
| selling these kinds of things. I always went for Dell
| Optiplex, but there are HP and Lenovo equivalents too
| G3rn0ti wrote:
| ARM or RISC-V based single board computers are becoming a
| thing. If one needs a small low-power Linux system with a
| fully-working desktop experience nothing beats those in terms
| of power consumption. Most of them are even passively cooled
| and, hence, very silent without efforts.
| steponlego wrote:
| A Mac LC absolutely sips power, you should see how long you'd
| have to run your $300 mini PC to save enough power to make it
| worthwhile.
| bilinguliar wrote:
| > energy doesn't grow on trees
|
| I think this statement may be wrong.
| prmoustache wrote:
| The thing is the fact it can work well on an old imac g3/g4
| means you can probably have a decent enough experience on an
| old raspberry pi 3 or similar or that 30$ laptop with a much
| more recent cpu and 1G of ram that is also supported by
| openbsd.
| nativecoinc wrote:
| I mostly use my work computer in my free time.
|
| The ultimate test: can you develop Java on it? (In practice, not
| in principle.)
| gorky1 wrote:
| Intellij Idea on Linux runs surprisingly well on 15 year old
| T400 Thinkpads. It's actually pleasant to use for small hobby
| Java projects.
| AprilArcus wrote:
| Would love know more about the "dire state" of ppc32 linux
| goosedragons wrote:
| No big distro supports it and I can only think of one that
| still does (Adelie). Modern web browsers won't easily compile
| for it, probably other packages. And soon support for GPUs like
| the ATI Rage commonly used in 1998-2001ish era Macs will be
| removed from the kernel.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| Isn't there an unofficial Debian port? Stuff can be added
| back to the kernel if people commit to maintain it and keep
| it in line with the evolving code base.
| UncleSlacky wrote:
| MintPPC is quite good (or was last time I tried it):
|
| http://mintppc.nl
| c-smile wrote:
| > computer e.g. in the shape of a 10" netbook I'll buy it
| immediately
|
| Haven't tried OpenBSD but Windows 11 works quite well Samsung
| Galaxy Book 2 (ARM):
|
| https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/26/18024696/samsung-galaxy-...
|
| It has superb monitor, touchpad, touchscreen, pen and detachable
| keyboard.
|
| I am running Visual Studio 2022 on it to build Sciter - quite
| convenient to test and debug handling of those input devices.
|
| It is really quite good machine for mobile use.
|
| You can buy second hand Samsung Galaxy Book 2 for ~200-300 USD
| amelius wrote:
| > While I fully acknowledge there's a lot you can't do on a
| system like this (Docker, anything GPU related) it's still able
| to do a lot of productive work without feeling like a total dog
| to use.
|
| This, of course, is becoming less and less true.
| anthk wrote:
| How so? Celeron, 2GB of RAM, ~4GB with compressed ZRAM.
| Libreoffice works, most stuff works with GL 2.1, even 720p
| video with MPV. LibreOffice, Ted, Abiword, GNUMeric...
|
| For the rest, UBlock Origin it's your friend and
| git://bitreich.org/privacy-haters to cut in half the
| realistical Chromium requeriments.
| abricot wrote:
| If you are happy not surfing most of the Web, any computer is
| good enough.
|
| It's usually browsers and web pages that brings these older PCs
| down.
| drpixie wrote:
| Presumably the result of Google making Chromium more and more
| like a whole OS (and everyone else following along). Is it
| ridiculous to give a browser such fine-grained access to your
| computer? If we were actually designing web standards for
| usability (instead of for maximising attention) our browsers
| would look al= lot more like Web 1.0 and nothing like Web 3.0!
| fooker wrote:
| It was java applets or flash before this.
| sourcecodeplz wrote:
| I've heard there's quite the group here on HN that browse the
| web on CLI browsers.
| andai wrote:
| Been a while, but I had a better time with w3m. I think it
| was the only textmode browser I tried that preserved the
| nesting of comments on HN.
|
| Context: I was on a 3kbps connection and basically everything
| was unusable, so I ran a textmode browser on a VPS over Mosh.
| anthk wrote:
| I did that, literally the same, but with lynx/links instead
| of w3m over a pubnix with mosh.
|
| Also, gopher sites thru gopher://hngopher.com and
| gopher://magical.fish.
|
| I could even play some streaming radio with OPUS @16KBPS
| from http://dir.xiph.org once I set mplayer to cache the
| 90% of the stream.
| canadianfella wrote:
| [dead]
| mjhay wrote:
| It's not something that's remotely practical on most modern
| sites. I hate everything new as well, but at some point it's
| easier to just suck it up and face the hell that is the
| modern internet.
| prmoustache wrote:
| The thing is w3m really filter yourself out of the shitty
| web. Most interesting websites are quite readable on w3m.
| The ones that aren't are usually the worst ones or thoses
| that provide an api for which better gui and tui clients
| exist.
| rewgs wrote:
| I use w3m as often as I can. I already pretty much live in
| the command line, and text-heavy sites like HN or some sort
| of documentation look just fine (or, IMO, even better) via
| w3m. Not always, but often. It's a very nice option to have.
| Sakos wrote:
| I used to use a CLI client for Reddit primarily. It was
| great. Maybe I should check that out again...something about
| the CLI really appeals to me.
| anthk wrote:
| You have ttrv and lynx gopher://gopherddit.com.
| pjmlp wrote:
| I used Lynx every now and then, back in the mid-90's.
| Eventually it is time to move on.
| [deleted]
| amatecha wrote:
| We do have basically latest Firefox on OpenBSD. But yeah, to be
| fair, I have to restart Firefox frequently on my X230's running
| OpenBSD. It either just stops rendering altogether (literally
| even application UI fails to render) or eats up so much memory
| and CPU the cooling fan is just always running at a kinda high
| level. Otherwise, it's super solid and a great OS for older
| machines IMO.
| hamstrunghuman wrote:
| [dead]
| AstixAndBelix wrote:
| When I really think about the kinds of things I find essential in
| a computer, almost everything could be achieved with a TUI or a
| very light GUI.
|
| Unfortunately, the problem of proprietary software and APIs is
| always around the corner. I can use a TUI client for Telegram,
| but I can't if I want to message someone on Facebook. I can use a
| simple newsreader for blogs, but I can't for my friends'
| Instagram posts.
|
| I could honestly scrap by with a 20yo computer if the world was
| more open sourced. Such a shame
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