Glad you are into music. The antiques market is very special and niche, it is mostly clean tho and contributes to economy, makes folks happy, so it is fine. It is not for all tho, specially the poor like me.

I came across this site also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T61p

They are cheap as they are old and likely used up a lot. Laptops last a lot less than desktops, not much to upgrade.
Good to use them as long as they last.

It is the folks who work with, buy the latest find those who use older IT stuffs annoying. However, to each their own.

Edited to add:
T61 was released in 2006 and is a C2D with 4G ram. To me this is quite advanced as it will be excellent for videos and some more recent gaming also.

My current bad luck, fridge has stopped functioning properly and is no longer cool. Just in time for summer. Landlady has to replace or repair but is super slow at these things.

At times like this, very dark classic audiobooks help me to appreciate the good things I still have.

Atari Co-Founder Ted Dabney Dead At 81
Dabney developed the first commercially available video game.
https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/...b0568a880c878b

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Dabney

Edited to add:

He was also involved with this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_E._Cheese%27s

Related note worthy mention
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nolan_Bushnell

The one thing this thread didn't focus much on is the people behind the old computers and software who made it all happen. This will be another interesting area to reflect on.

This is the Thinkpad Wiki page for the T61, you can see all models from the menu:

https://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:T61

I like the T61 best because they seem the right size to me, are tough as nails, upgradable to 8GB RAM (both of my are 4G but I upgraded by T400 to 8GB RAM), and the one I'm using now has a 15.4" 1680x1050 (WSXGA+) widescreen with a beautiful picture. I paid $52 for it if memory serves me, I don't remember if shipping was included but it's usually not more than $15 if it isn't.

You just have to be looking at the right time to buy, know what to look for in signs of wear like shiny keys or a spots on the spacebar, does it still have the stickers on the palmrest, and most importantly buy from someone with a good sellers rep. Business lease returns are half my inventory but it's the luck of the draw which one they grab out of a stack. I've always had good luck.

You want to watch for Nvidia chips made after 2008 as they overheat. Don't fall for the "Safe Date" spiel one guy has been trying to sell his with for the past 2 years. Both of my T61 use Nvidia Quadro NVS 140M but were made before 2008.

Compare distro packages:
https://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?re...mpare-packages

This is helpful to remember for old PCs.

Very nice tips, anymore such are welcome. Thanks for sharing in advance.
What do you use your old laptops for ?

Everything. :) There isn't anything computer related I want to do that I can't on my laptops and still have resources to spare.

I listen to music the whole time I'm at the computer with some lightweight headphones, work with The GIMP on a daily basis and sometimes make wallpapers with it, do a lot of text editing, downloading of files, watch videos on youtube, convert the sound from videos into .ogg format, rip CD's, burn DVD's, listen to internet radio, occasionally watch a movie on VLC, transcoding of videos, surf the net, etc.

I don't like using wine and don't often play games, but have played Moria and some others from the FreeBSD ports collection. I have a Win10Pro HDD I swap out for the OpenBSD HDD in my W520 to occasionally play Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, since it's the most powerful of my machines.

A T61 with Core2 Duo @ 2.0GHz and 4GB RAM should be more than capable for anything you'd probably have a use for doing. It's what I've been using the whole time we've talked.

Have you ever gotten laptops for free from a buddy, local freecycle or via dumpster diving etc., What kind was it and how did it go ? Thanks.

My main laptop at the moment is a Toshiba Satellite Pro that I bought for £60, it has a Celeron 1.3GHz processor, 2GB ram, 250GB HDD, & an 11.6" screen.
With this I surf the web, watch videos, & play music files, but sometimes I need to record my playing to post to one of my forums, so I plug in a USB mic, & record with audacity.

I have given away to my nephew a Toshiba 1GB ram, 80GB HDD, dvd-rw, 12" screen.

Freecycle'd my old HP 540, 1GB ram, & just recently, my Advent 12" laptop, 1.5GB ram, with an external 20GB HDD.
I also gave away a 19" WXGA monitor that I just found to be too big for comfortable use.

Other than my Tosh laptop, I have set up a Raspberry Pi3B 1GB ram, with an externally powered 320GB HDD, & an 11.6" HDMI monitor on my computer table, it's a lovely quiet setup. :)

Downstairs, I use an Acer A0722, 2GB ram, 11.6" laptop with a 64GB SSD for checking the weather & my emails first thing in the morning.

I'm not bragging, just showing that whilst I could buy a new computer/laptop, I just don't have a need to. :)

My sisters husband dropped a can of beenie-weenies or something on the palmrest of his Gateway NV53A laptop, which was actually made by Acer. It wouldn't run without periodically rebooting itself and he couldn't get his Win7 re-installation disks to work. He was going to throw it away and my sister mentioned I might like to have it.

All it needed a new HDD so I replaced it for about $50, it's my OpenIndiana box now. That wouldn't have happened with a T61. They have rubber rails on the HDD caddy to cushion it from things like that.

I felt bad about telling him that's all it took but he was just happy I got it to work.

Member response
 

Hi,


My main Laptop is a Dell XPS701 refurbished for a great price and is 5 years old this month. Upgrade to a SSD & 16GB memory running Slackware64 with Windows on a secondary drive. I'll keep it as long as it can be maintained. I did buy a new battery pack and replaced the wireless module because of erratic signal.

I've got several refurbished Dell Laptops but are used minimal limited times and will remain in use.

Hope this helps.
Have fun & enjoy!
:hattip:

My laptop, Littleboy, is a second-hand Samsung from Computer Exchange. I bought it as a birthday present because I felt it was high time I learned to use one, but I'm not really very taken with it. It only has 1 GB of memory, whereas my old desktop machine, Bigboy, has 2 GB. And I really prefer using a proper keyboard and mouse. When I use Littleboy, I always feel that I'm playing with a toy, not using a computer.

All my peripherals were foundlings.

I could be really anal and add to my collection .

But I won't.

Thing about online purchase is that I am in Canada, so there is the shipping, customs, exchange rate, clearance fees etc., etc., all these addup. Hence, rather buy local, i3 laptop on sale for $150 locally. Checked recently and good to be aware about.