Have you just bought a spanking new PC? Congrats!!! Now the useless piece of junk (the old PC) has just been rendered, well, useless. So what do you do with your trusty old PC? Just discard it? No, you can’t be that heartless! Well, since it’s sitting there taking your precious desk space, you might as well make use of it. So here are some interesting and useful things you can do with your old PC.
Note: Anyone who has more than one PC in his home can use these tips.
Media Player
Your computer (old or new) is one of the best media players you can get. It can play all formats of music and videos. New formats can be made compatible simply by installing the required codecs. Any computer with about 64MB of RAM can play MP3, WMA, MPEG and AVI files with ease. You’ll need at least Windows 98 to be able to install good media players like Winamp and VLC Media Player, which run well on low-end systems. However, if you want to convert your computer exclusively into a jukebox, I recommend removing Windows and installing GeexBox, a Linux distribution which is a media player in itself. Note that GeexBox only plays music and videos, and doesn’t do anything else. So if you install this, you won’t be able to use your PC for anything else.
Multimedia Server
If your old PC is not capable of playing music and videos, or lacks a sound card, or for some reason you want to use your new PC to do the playing, you can use your old PC as a media server. That means it will contain all the files (music and videos) but the new PC will play them. It’s very simple to do this. Just add a network card to the old PC (if it doesn’t have one) and connect the new PC with it. This will create a network and the PCs will be able to access each other’s shared resources. Store all your music and videos in the old PC and play them with the new PC. You’ll need a large capacity hard disk in your old PC to store all your media and still have room for more.
Television
You can convert your old PC into a television very easily. Anything above a Pentium 2 with at least 256MB RAM will suffice. You just need a TV Tuner card and a TV connection (obviously 
). The TV tuner will have a remote with it so you can watch TV from your couch. If your computer is strong enough and has sufficient HDD space, you can even store TV shows and games to see them at a later time.
Download Manager
This is one of the best ways to utilize the resources of your old PC. Convert it into a download machine. The basic idea is that your old PC takes care of all the file downloads and leaves the new PC free for you to enjoy. Install any good download manager (like FlashGet, Free Download Manager, Internet Download Manager, etc.) and download everything through them. You can schedule your downloads and also instruct your PC to shut down once the downloads complete. Install a good antivirus which is low on resources (like NOD32) and schedule it to scan all of your downloads. This way you can be safe from viruses and other malware. In fact, Free Download Manager(FDM) even has a remote client, meaning you can access it from your new PC or over the internet and manage your downloads.
Torrent Machine
This too works like a download machine but in this method, the PC downloads only from torrents. Install a good torrent client like uTorrent. Like FDM, uTorrent has a Web UI from which you can access it through the internet or the LAN. So if you use this method, you don’t even need a monitor screen for your old computer as you can manage your torrents through the new PC. Install a good antivirus like NOD32 in this case too as torrents can be a source of many viruses/malware.
Internet Browser and Chat Machine
You can use your old PC solely for browsing the net, so that the new PC is free to do other work. For this, install a good browser like Opera, Chrome or Firefox on the old PC and surf the net through it. You can also install MSN/Yahoo Messenger, GTalk, Skype and other IM and VoIP clients and use it to chat with your friends and relatives. Be sure to attach a mike first if you want to talk to them. If you attach a webcam, you can have video chats with others!
Internet Router/Proxy Server
Your old PC can be easily converted into an internet router or proxy server. For this, you just need to install a Proxy server like Wingate or Winproxy and configure it. Your computer can then be used to share your internet connection with other computers on your network easily. Better still, install a Linux distro which has features like DHCP host et al.
Gaming!
True your old PC can’t run the new games. But in its glorious days, it also had the then-latest hardware. There are oodles of abandonware available on the net which can run on the slowest of slow PCs. Even games like GTA and GTA2 can run on old hardware. Many Linux distros have games which are extremely fun and addictive but still light.
Family PC
Yet another way to utilize that golden oldie is by letting your whole family learn from it. Allow everyone to experiment on it. This way you won’t be posing any danger to your important files and critical data. Install some educational software and kids’ games and watch your kids’ interest soar. Anyways, nothing beats being a good Samaritan, does it?
Charity
If neither of the above tips work for you, then please don’t just discard the PC. There are many NGOs and other humanitarian societies which have even poorer computers. You can donate your PC to them. This way you will receive many blessings and some poor budding software engineer may realize his dream :’) .
One Response
It can play all formats of music and videos. New formats can be made compatible simply by installing the required coders.This is one of the best ways to utilize the resources of your old PC. Convert it into a download machine. The basic idea is that your old PC takes care of all the file downloads and leaves the new PC free for you to enjoy.Install a good anti virus which is low on resources (like NOD32) and schedule it to scan all of your downloads. This way you can be safe from viruses and other malware.