How useful is a (2007) HP Compaq 8510w notebook

[vryni]

Last night i found an HP Compaq notebook 8510w left on a street bench.

While i realize that it's a 2007 old Intel Core 2 Duo piece of hardware
Assuming that the hardware is intact and functioning
is there any way i can use it at home ?
Can i install Debian 9 on it ?

[Head_on_a_Stick]

Can i install Debian 9 on it ?

Don't see why not, try it and report back.

It should be useful for basic tasks but you're not going to be playing CS:GO on it, that's for sure

[pylkko]

You can. I have done it...

Though the graphics card is so incapable that in my opinion it's better to use a simple desktop environment. Gnome did work with my core 2 duo with intel graphics but it was a little stuttery. Not much but a little. I presume that the same would apply to KDE. It finally broke down to the extent that I stopped repairing it but it was running Debian 9 from its release to a few weeks ago.

[GarryRicketson]

I have one of those, but don't run Debian on it, I run OpenBsd,..
But before you go installing anything, wouldn't the right thing to do be to make some attempt to see if the owner can be found,? they might be looking for it, it might have a lot things on it really important to them.

[Head_on_a_Stick]

wouldn't the right thing to do be to make some attempt to see if the owner can be found,?

+1

Theft by finding is a crime in the UK, at least.

And in the US, apparently: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theft_by_ ... ted_States

[pylkko]

if you don't know who it belongs to you might be able to find out by snooping around on the disk, most people don't encrypt their drives anyway...

in case you find it hard to motivate yourself to do this due to the positive effects that altruism demonstrably has on your psychology, then you can think that the person might be willing to pay a reward for returning it that easily exceeds the value of the antiquated hardware...

[GarryRicketson]

Not knowing what part of the world this occurred in, I don't know, but many local areas have newspapers, and will run a found add for free, I would make some effort to find the owner, after a few weeks, if no one claims it , yes it could be use full, assuming it works ok.
What OS is on it, ? will it boot ? Seems odd that someone would just leave it on a park bench, maybe something bad happened, kidnapped or something,...
Maybe they just forgot it, and will return looking for it, a note taped to the park bench with a phone number or way to contact you might be all they need to find it,..
If it has a OS, a tech could probably hack the password, and see what is in it, there might be some info that shows who the owner is.

[vryni]

The notebook with all it's wiring, 2 Netgear routers and other related gear
was left on a street "Giving bench", in a fairly well to do living neighborhood
along my routine evening walk.

[SunTzuTech]

I have an old Lenovo R61 that sat on my table for several years. (well, like 7) My gaming laptop obsoleted it.

I started a cleanup on it, by putting a cheap new ($17) 120GB SSD, cloning the original Windows 7 along with a cheap mini-pci wifi-N and CPU. I was amazed at how responsive it is, given its' age. The screen is a nice 1680x1050, but the Nvidia NV140 is good for web browing, and not much else.

I'm planning on putting Linux on it, once it's memory is replaced (I borrowed it to fix a netbook that really needed 2GB)

The HP you have has some decent (well, for the time) options for graphics, as well as the screen (if you got the 1080P screen, you got lucky). If you don't have a laptop, a cheap SSD with any other cheap upgrades you can put on it, wouldn't be a bad mobile unit.

[kevinthefixer]

I have an old Dell with similar hardware, core2duo and integrated graphics, 4GB RAM. IIRC I paid about US$80 for it "refurb" with WinXP. I installed an inexpensive SSD and Stretch/XFCE and was amazed at its speed. It boots in 20 seconds, from power-off to ready-to-work desktop. I wouldn't try any hairy video processing but minor photo touch-up is a breeze. So to answer your original question, yes, that unit is still a useful machine assuming it isn't broken.