I've got 2, possibly 3, older Dell machines that have Core 2 duo chips in there. Not sure what's in the 3rd machine, but guessing its similar. I think they either have 2 or 4 gb RAM. If I do anything with them, I'll trash the HDD in there and get something like this:

Kingston 120GB A400 SATA 3 2.5" Internal SSD

It is a fairly cheap SSD with good reviews (I might get the 240 version) and possibly add a big HDD. Or, I might just get a bigger Samsung SSD if I find a good use for one or all machines.

I already have a similar system running a file server. I'd possibly like to do one or more of the following:

-- dedicated Time Machine (mac) backups
-- something audio related for my studio (Windows VST plugins and soft synths, IF this chip will run them)
-- some sort of home media device, possibly Plex (not up to date on all that)
-- home security

Need to know if these chips will support this kind of stuff. I know I can do a Linux or BSD install for the TM.

Other ideas? Getting rid of them because they're of little use and value is obviously an option.

Emulation, older games, and honestly they're still decent daily Office/web computers. I'm usually on a HP that's about to turn 10 years old that I think has a core 2 duo. With maxed out RAM and a SSD it runs pretty well.

The Fife said:

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With maxed out RAM and a SSD it runs pretty well.

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This.

Setting up a Plex server and/or NAS on one of the devices makes sense to me.

Does the Plex need an SSD for all the content or just the OS? Also, how much RAM? Is 8g enough?

I have heard people say the best thing is to get an SSD for the OS and the metadata (poster art, thumbnails, etc.), but HDDs for the actual media when using Plex.

91AggieLawyer said:

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Does the Plex need an SSD for all the content or just the OS? Also, how much RAM? Is 8g enough?

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You're going to be really disappointed trying to use a core2duo for Plex if you have to do any type of transcoding. Even with a nice graphics card, it's going to severely struggle. I have an AMD media server from the same era that completely chokes on any 4k media. It's been turned into a NAS with a newer i3 box as the transcoding system.

91AggieLawyer said:

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Does the Plex need an SSD for all the content or just the OS? Also, how much RAM? Is 8g enough?

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I have 6GB but it turns out my normal laptop is an i5 (2.53) instead of a Core 2 Duo. It handles the normal daily stuff I throw at it anyway.

Turns out one I thought might be a C2D wasn't; it was an older chip -- Pentium something. One, I knew was older, and the one I knew was a C2D I had to bust out the DVD to get to the hard drive to take it out (for security). After all that, and not being able to identify for sure what version of the processor it was, I just decided to chunk all the machines. I looked on FB marketplace and found a cheap Xeon server I'm interested in. The processor is sufficient and the hardware will allow me to run the file server and Time Machine application I want. I hope the fan doesn't make too much noise. I will look to a media server later.

Thanks for all the input.

Could told me, would've taken the MB/CPU with ram!

Or any old HDs that people don't care about. They're used to store ROMs and IDGAF about whatever may already be on there.

How about older crap?

I still need to take it apart or fire it up to see what the CPU is, but its in an ASUS A7N8X mobo with 2x512MB ram and an old ATI graphics card (Radeon 9000-series of some sort)...

erudite said:

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Could told me, would've taken the MB/CPU with ram!

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Someone picked all of them up off the street. They were gone before the trash guys got there yesterday. So, at least as of now, they're not going into the landfill.

jbryan10 said:

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How about older crap?

I still need to take it apart or fire it up to see what the CPU is, but its in an ASUS A7N8X mobo with 2x512MB ram and an old ATI graphics card (Radeon 9000-series of some sort)...

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Crazy thing is, I have a system that uses very similar components and would be happy to rehome that! Yours is a step up from mine. I put it together in late 2002 and it always ran hot no matter what I did.

Mine is
ASUS A7V8X
Athlon XP / don't recall the speed
Radeon 9700 (128MB RAM)
768MB RAM (512 / open / 256)

Totally serious BTW if you're not interested in the parts

So what do you even use yours for? I don't imagine it would be useful for Plex

jbryan10 said:

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So what do you even use yours for? I don't imagine it would be useful for Plex

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Old games, my brother bought loads of them in the late '90s to mid 2000s and they run great on that kind of system. Anyway if you end up deciding to get rid of the parts I could definitely use the stuff.

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