@nutbastard: They should also have a battlemodo between this and the last-generation CRT iMac running Tiger (750 MHz G3, I believe.) Of course the operating systems are entirely different.

Nintenboy01

Probably cost you more than that to dispose it of properly (i.e. not dumped in landfill)

wjousts

ive got ubuntu running like greased lightning on a 400mhz dell. this would be faster. can we get a battlemodo for this and the G whatever walmart 'puter?

nutbastard

@speakafreaka: Don't I know it. I work for Dell tech support and most people who call in for ancient systems either bought them from a garage sale or some fly-by-night website, and have some pretty weird ideas about how to treat a PC...

Nintenboy01

That computer has better specs than the 8-year-old Gateway my mom's been using.

infmom

ah the netvista M42.. i know where all of these came from: we just decomissioned about 200 of them from a site at my work and replaced them with new dells.

They were still alright for their time, we were running XP on them, albeit slowly with 128mb. The problem is that the sort of person that would buy this would have it riddled with spyware within two weeks.

speakafreaka

i think its great, if you notice by scrolling to the bottom of the page of a site of mine [latveria.info] a computer like this can spawn further developement. I started a streak of system builds with an optiplex 10gb hdd and p3 800mhz with 256 ram, used to purchase new parts online. Meanwhile, taking over the world from Latveria.

foxinyablox

Other than ram, and hard drive, it is pretty identical to my windows home server box. This plus old ram and usb card would make a pretty good NAS.

wilson

@Monty: Yeah no shit. After hyping those gOS machines a week ago you think there'd be some love for a machine than can do pretty much the same thing for less than half the price. I think lightweight Linux distro would run just fine on one of these. Would be fine for a fileserver, or a HTPC if you use a TV card with a hardware encoder.

junyo

Favorite line from the site:

"No one will notice the extra $40 charge on their credit cards. And if they do, go ahead and tell them - you got a COMPUTER for that Forty Bucks, I mean come on...it's only 40 bucks and its not like you went out and got drunk or partied all night....you got a friggin Computer, so if they have a problem with that, then they should lighten up and at least recognize your attempt to save them money when they unknowingly buy you computers."

Seriously, though, you could do okay with this thing if you, say... loaded linux on it.

keronian

My friend still runs an old Dell with a 733 MHz Coppermine P3 and 512 megs of RAM. Still a decent performer at everything except games and higher end multimedia apps.

Nintenboy01

We still have a few of those running in my office at a University.

Derrick

It's not that bad of a deal if you have an old HDD and memory floating around somewhere.

lburgguy

I still rock Win2k on some of my machines. And though I'm also running multi-core and Vista systems, my PC needs really stopped evolving at my P-III 450mhz system with a TV tuner.

Sure I use the extra horsepower of my newer machines, but I could fairly easily get along without it...and so could the vast majority of people. These systems will fulfill basic needs at a low cost and delay functional hardware from hitting the landfill.

Why not...if nothing else it will be a cheap way to give younger kids a machine they can mess up with wild abandon, or help provide households with multiple HS/College kids enough workstations that they won't have to share. Sounds fine to me...

OddManOut

Can it run a web browser? Can it download email? Seems like the perfect home computer for 90% of the market to me. And, don't forget that this sucker is saving you electricity, too, with a low wattage P3 cpu powering it. Sure, I wouldn't touch the thing, but this would cover most home computer use these days.

Monty

If they sell it for no more than $30 with free shipping, I'm game. What's sad is that the Wii's CPU is still slower than this...

Nintenboy01

This is miles ahead of the Pentium (no numbers) 333Mhz Dell running Windows 98 that I have to use while living at home with my dad because its the only system hooked up to our 56K Dial-Up internet connection! Olde skool.

LastVigilante

@niravabhavsar: Actually I've noticed that having a graphics card capable of decent video and GUI acceleration (at least an Nvidia TNT or ATI Rage 128) helps a lot at improving multimedia performance like basic DVD playback and web page rendering, moreso than the CPU.

Nintenboy01

I still have a PII 400 Mhz desktop with 128 mb ram and 17 gb HDD running on Win 2000. And, it works fine for surfing and listening to music.

niravabhavsar

why is there a pentium 4 logo on the box in the picture?

oldmanstan

I got 4 computers with these specs (actually better) for FREE!!!! My neighbor works at a business and they throw these old PCs away. I'm a packrat so he gave it to me and now I have extra computers for parts, etc. and building an always-on server.

nintendude

@oldmanstan: Maybe because the junk dealer was too damn lazy to take a real picture or find a photo using a 5 second Google search (netvista a40) of one of these pieces of crap that they're selling and raping people with shipping charges for?

Tony C

I have a Duron 900Mhz all-in-one MB setup that runs gOS, Ubuntu, and even WinXP not too badly.
It's got a 10GB HD, 640MB of PC133 RAM as well as a couple of other modifications of my own.

It's not quite up to the Kessel Run, but it was VERY inexpensive to put together and has served as a capable platform for my explorations with these other operating systems.

If someone is stuck for a machine to do the basics with they can often deal with a little sluggishness if it means a reliable setup.

strider_mt2k

Basics?

I still use an 866 P3 running Win2000 in my recording studio, to record 16 channels at once and mix down with EQ & FX. It boots a lot faster than my 3.2 Ghz home PC, because I haven't installed a load of bloated software on it.

cbdsteve

That's the specs of my current and only pc that i'm using right now.
Anyone who wants to donate their throw-away PCs or their ancient lappys are welcome.

providehope@gmail.com

geek-to-be

What I really like about their product page is that when you click on "view larger image", the image that pops up is actually smaller than the first on.

hanswurst0815

My god.....those are the computers we use at work!

OtakuboyT

Ok, I'm currently running a P3 800MHz Dell XPS system w/ 512MB RDRAM (yes, that old, expensive RAMBUS stuff). Although I'm itching REALLY bad to build a new computer, but I've been holding off for 2 reasons: 1) I paid $3,200 for this system!! (that was when it had 128MB, 80GB, 19" CRT) so I'm trying to get my freaking money's worth by stretching its useful life cycle out of it. 2) I've been waiting for a native quad core system (either AMD's Phenom (Q4 '07) or Intel's Nehalem (H2 '08). I'm not a gamer, but I'm on this computer about 5 hours a day (internet/email/word/photo-editing/dvd-burning) and its not bad. So when I see that this advertised system is 133MHz faster than mine (granted much more stripped down) for that little... I'm like... if it works for me (an Electrical Engineer who designs microchips - but not on THIS computer) then it should be a great deal for the majority. Plus, I'm ALL for RECYCLING and minimizing electronics putting put in Landfills... So my hats go off to the sellers of these re-used PC's! :)

quik37silver