[sclug] Cheap'n'nasty Tesco Linux machines

[M.Blackmore]

On Fri, 2008-03-14 at 17:52 +0000, Alex Butcher wrote:
> 
> Bear in mind the support issues!

In that they are on their own ... the village has a strong waste
action/environmental group as does the historical wychwood area, and one
of the things I'm trying to get people to do is look beyond the
wastebin, recycling and packaging towards things like electronic waste,
which is hugely more impactive upon the environment. Now, a lot of
people are muttering about upgrading old computers, some of this will be
a waste for them - just a change to linux will do fine if we can
persuade them to shift and bluntly most of this lot don't need any MS
Office software for any particular compatibility reason like people
sending them documents. Others really do have old kit that modern
linuxii are getting a bit grumpy on and would appreciate something a bit
more snappy - I don't think we're going to sell damn small linux to this
lot.

So a bulk purchase of refurbished computers is a form of recycling, and
freecycle experience has demonstrated that stuff down in the 400mhz/4gb
disk size range is snapped up by people looking for computers, a lot of
whom are on benefits level incomes and anything will be a blessing (I
just make sure they can't connect to the internet with Windows but load
up a modern low resource linux for them when I remainder old kit onto
freecycle as win9x can't be secured etc.).

Ordering up a pallet or two of nice kit might fly around here if I get a
list together - at a meeting inagurating a local environmental website
project a lot of the participants were talking about the "need" to
upgrade and it was making me and the couple of other computer nerds
about the place think upon issues a bit as the danger is that they will
just go down to PCWorld and buy whatever crap is being done there.
> 
> Not individually coded, but XP does require activation. I really don't
> think
> that a COA is sufficient to run anything other that the original OEM
> install
> of Windows.

This was what I was wondering about - the activation and what number
needed typing in, off the CD/CD cover or off the serial number on the
side of the box?

For me a warez would do as I'd only be using it for some kids games, off
the internet by strict order - other people might have to (though I
wonder about the "might have to") be legit and how would one go about
giving them something that could be activated. If the original box had a
preinstalled windows and there is a licence number written on the side
why wouldn't that work for activation??