Dell Dimension CPS D333

PGdude · 2 Oct 2009 at 23:36

Not sure if you've ever heard of this, but that ancient beast is doing nothing at all in my room.

Intel PII333MHz Processor
6.4GB Hard Drive - Windows 95
128MB Memory
1.44" Floppy Drive
32x CD-ROM Drive
DVD ROM Drive
ZIP drive?
1 ea AGP Slot (nVidia FX something or the other)
4 ea PCI Slots(with some stuff)
2 ea ISA Slots
Sound Card of some sort

Is this kind of machine usable for anything at all? It's just taking up space in my room!

Ultim8 · 2 Oct 2009 at 23:41

whack some big hard drives in it and setup a linux server for all your movies, music ect ect,
get a new SSD for your main rig and dump all the hard drives out of that in it too

dangerstat · 3 Oct 2009 at 00:02

PGdude said:
Not sure if you've ever heard of this, but that ancient beast is doing nothing at all in my room.

Intel PII333MHz Processor

6.4GB Hard Drive - Windows 95

128MB Memory

1.44" Floppy Drive

32x CD-ROM Drive

DVD ROM Drive

ZIP drive?

1 ea AGP Slot (nVidia FX something or the other)

4 ea PCI Slots(with some stuff)

2 ea ISA Slots

Sound Card of some sort

Is this kind of machine usable for anything at all? It's just taking up space in my room!

Don't put some large HDDs in there as the above suggests. That's a pretty old spec. It will run some Linux distro's but you'll struggle to get a decent window manager loaded I'd imagine. A base Debian install with XFCE might work? In reality it's pretty useless bar anything that simple code development, and even then if you have a decent spec'd main machine you'd be pushed to find much for it to do. This kind of spec really just needs retiring to the computer graveyard in the sky.

Ultim8 · 3 Oct 2009 at 00:20

how can you say its useless? albeit its very old and for a couple of hundred quid you could build something massively faster now days, but you can get linux distro's that run off a floppy and have samba? or with a gui with something like corel linux which supports samba and was designed to run on P2/P3's

PGdude · 3 Oct 2009 at 02:16

Hm.

I think I'll want to be rid of that spec. But then I just realised I still have my 1.8GHz Willamette Celeron (And its necessary parts). Would anything worthwhile come of that?

memyselfandi · 3 Oct 2009 at 07:24

dangerstat said:
Don't put some large HDDs in there as the above suggests. That's a pretty old spec. It will run some Linux distro's but you'll struggle to get a decent window manager loaded I'd imagine. A base Debian install with XFCE might work? In reality it's pretty useless bar anything that simple code development, and even then if you have a decent spec'd main machine you'd be pushed to find much for it to do. This kind of spec really just needs retiring to the computer graveyard in the sky.

No, Ultim8 is right ... throwing it away would be a waste and the OP should throw some more disk at it and use it as a linux server.

The points you make about window managers etc are non-applicable as you are using it as a dedicated server, you don't need to even run any window manager on it as you can just do any admin stuff via the command line.

You can then use it to serve out files to your other machines and it doesn't matter if you rebuild your main box as your data is on the server.

Nate Silvers · 3 Oct 2009 at 07:52

Donate it to charity.

PGdude · 3 Oct 2009 at 23:10

File server sounds cool, donating is another...

What about a Dedicated Server for multiplayer games?

Or is that too much for 1.8GHz of not that great processing power?

dangerstat · 3 Oct 2009 at 23:44

memyselfandi said:
No, Ultim8 is right ... throwing it away would be a waste and the OP should throw some more disk at it and use it as a linux server.

The points you make about window managers etc are non-applicable as you are using it as a dedicated server, you don't need to even run any window manager on it as you can just do any admin stuff via the command line.

You can then use it to serve out files to your other machines and it doesn't matter if you rebuild your main box as your data is on the server.

No your wrong. This is pointless for £35 you can buy an ex-corp Dell with a 2.4Ghz P4/Celeron chip on a much newer platform (with SATA support for a start) that'd rape that PII. On your current system you'd be throwing money on PATA disks, which you won't be able to use after you dump that PII! It's just pointless. It'd be epically stupid, plus it'll probably hit storage size limit on your BIOS then your messing around with preloading drivers - just hassle and costs. Upgrading a PII is not economical at all anymore - unless your literaly so skint you can't afford £30!

A 1.8Ghz Celeron on the other hand isn't a terrible option for a file server if you have a board with SATA controller or a supply of PATA disks to use in it. I'm all for keeping old machines going but all in all (especially if your going to be adding parts) it's cheaper to go with something newer.

LeJosh · 3 Oct 2009 at 23:46

Use it as a Warcraft 1 2; Command and conquer etc. box.

Actually if you can find Settlers 2 then you'll feel more satisfied ever than before with gaming. I love settlers 2 lol

icysniper · 4 Oct 2009 at 12:00

sell it to a collector and see what you get for it

LordSplodge · 4 Oct 2009 at 12:04

dangerstat said:
Don't put some large HDDs in there as the above suggests. That's a pretty old spec. It will run some Linux distro's but you'll struggle to get a decent window manager loaded I'd imagine.

If he was going to run it as a server why would he need a Window Manager? Sure the computer is old but it isn't useless.

However aside from disagreeing with you about the computer being useless I cannot see it as being much use to the OP unless he really needs to turn it into a DNS, DHCP or Routing box!