Guess that P4 laptop has been beaten to death now, fans, PSU, HD etc., may fail anytime. So buying that is a big gamble.

As an aside, my old PC is hanging when scripts are run on a site, so slowly this is reducing my surfing, will try and make peace with this.

^ well i'll say this once to you:
you live in a "western" country, yes?
the cost of food and rent and that sort of stuff is probably so high (like it is in every "western" country), that I may safely assume that even the poorest person can afford to spend ~100 extra credits for something once or twice a year. i speak from experience.

if you search a little (ebay, other local or national online markets), you can get very much for that!
if you buy components only and reuse parts you already have, even more. but laptops are cheap, too.
there's a constant flood of shiny new electronics coming in, and if you're happy with the second or third best, you can get away with spending next to nothing.

do that.

you can still follow your hobby (which i appreciate & share to some extent), but don't make yourself suffer on your everyday machine.

You have some very good points. If it becomes critical, I will go to a public place like a library etc., to browse a specific site that doesn't work on my PC.
Regarding getting more hardware, folks are even discarding these in dumpsters, it
has come to the point that I simply can't take in anymore hardware even for free except for specific components like HD etc., Now when it comes to older PCs, I am moving more towards software, emulators etc., this gives retro experience without the hardware overstocking.

This video shows an entire city that lives on recycling waste:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0s7WsoC528

It is sort of an eye opener that even in third world countries the used goods
consumerism is quite high. Dumpster divers in West are doing the same but in
a much smaller scale. For a small person in the right location, one can get a lot
of IT hardware in just few months or even weeks if this is done consistently. After
that, it is better to just buy anything specifically needed as used.

For a person who is lonely, bored etc., the old PC is a very great device to
stay entertained, amused and relive the past experiences. Even reading old computer
and device manuals with a fresh child like perspective is a satisfying and enriching
experience. This way, the old PC becomes priceless.

Few months ago a concern was raised here about support being dropped for i686 and
older systems by few Linux Distros one after the other.

However, it is nice to see that there are few OSes coming out that still support
such older PCs. Here is a good example:
https://minino.galpon.org/
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=minino

AntiX is a good distro for old equipment - http://antix.mepis.org/index.php?title=Main_Page

EDIT: You might also check out TinyCore & SliTaz.

i've seen this before.
they've been at it for a long while now, and iirc the spanish or portuguese government uses that distro, or maybe schools.
anyhow, longevity without much noise is always a plus for a distro.

Manjaro is also good for older PCs it seems:
http://www.everydaylinuxuser.com/201...iew-of_22.html

http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/...-pentium4.html

Nice thread above on why folks still use P4.

As an aside, if there are browser issues the Manjaro review says to use Google Chrome, what do you all think of Google Chrome browser and privacy, tracking etc.,

For a Pentium 4, use Chromium instead of Chrome. Google no longer provides 32 bit google-chrome. If you want a secure web browser, you'll have to use Chromium of something else (like Firefox). And "something else" will either be much less efficient (Firefox) or much less compatible with modern web sites (everything else?).

Or maybe Opera. I honestly haven't tried Opera in a while, so I can't say how it compares with chromium on an old Pentium 4.

Anyway, that thread is from 2014, and I'd say a P4 is no longer really viable for general web browsing. Okay, it's fine if you don't watch any sort of video (YouTube, Netflix, etc). But video playback on the web has just gotten too demanding for all but the fastest P4s.

[edit added:] Oh, I forgot that some later Pentium 4 processers could actually run 64 bit. In that case, Chrome is an option. And if you want to use Netflix or anything else that requires DRM, it's the better option. (The other option is Firefox, but it will just be too sluggish.)

Member response
 

Hi,

I believe that some maintainers will support 32 bit systems for the world community. The problem is that people expect to run up to date or current applications. Most 32 bit systems have limited hardware as compared to modern 64 bit systems so those people who wish to continue to use 32 bit should not expect a miracle.

Newbie alert: 50 Open Source Replacements for Windows XP is a sticky that list potential Gnu/Linux for XP class machines. So you should be able to find something within that list.

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

There are probably as many 32bit machines in the World as there are 64bit ones, if not more and I would imagine most of those embedded in other hardware are 32bit.
I have 5 machines here and only ONE of them is 64bit capable.

True, but perhaps not for long. All of the machines I see that are not SBC or dedicated use machines (and even some of those) are all arriving 64-bit capable now. As your 32-bit hardware retires (or smokes) it will be replaced by hardware that can run 64-bit. That is why distributions and applications are moving to 64-bit, it is better and a better match for the current and future hardware.

I still see cases for fast, small machines that are 32-bit, compatible with legacy applications, and that lend themselves to embedded deployment or dense virtualization nicely. That is not the general case, and will not drive the majority of distributions or commercial operating systems.

For now, we still have interesting 32-bit choices. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Very little of the software is better or even as well written. Most is bloated and written in high level languages that require huge libraries to support them. Long gone are the days of tight efficient code.

#1 better is not well defined. "Better for what?", or "better in what way?" are critical questions.

#2 Tight, efficient code are not gone, and not everyone uses high level languages. Some of the best, fastest packages use lower level code (and even here, low and high are not well defined) so a generalization is likely to be misleading.

OS examples, the family of OS products based upon clean, fast assembler code. My favorite is KOLIBRIOS. Admitted, you need to LOOK for it to find it, but do not assume it is not there.