The days of the netbook are over – it’s all about the tablets now. But what if
you’ve still got an Eee PC or a Dell Mini gathering dust somewhere? There’s no
need to let them rot just because you’ve got a new Nexus 7. Need a new way to freshen up your aging netbook? Here
are five ideas to spring some life into your tiny laptop warrior in 2013.
Turn it into a media Centre
Your old netbook is small enough to fit under the TV, so why not make the most of it? Most support VGA out, and some even pack a digital HDMI connection, so pair the two up. You can turn it into a media centre using solutions such as Plex or XBMC, then kick back with some streaming goodness as you stream the likes of Netflix, YouTube or TVCatchup.
Make your own retro games machine
Your netbook has more processing power than yesteryear’s arcade cabinets, so why not turn it into one? Hook up your Bluetooth PS3 controller, grab the Wireless Xbox 360 dongle for your Xbox pad or just plug in a USB controller and kick back with classic games that you know will run on it – check out GOG.com for all the classic games you could ever want, or even fiddle around with retro emulators. The sky’s the limit for this one, friend.
Roll your own home server
Netbooks are as quiet as they are power sipping, so what better use for them than as a server? Hook yours up in a location where you’ll be happy with it running most of the time, plug in a hard drive and get it equipped as a file server for all your media, photos, songs and anything else you want to store – you could even configure it as a Plex Media Server to haul over files to other Plex-friendly devices like your Xbox 360, PS3 or smartphone.
Have your own dedicated news ticker
Working with two screens is a massive productivity boost, but what if you don’t have a spare monitor handy, and just your old netbook? Why not turn it into a dedicated Twitter reader with TweetDeck or use it for all your RSS news feeds so you can focus on your main computer and glance every now and again to see what’s happening.
Install Jolicloud
If your netbook’s collapsing under the weight of Windows, you can give it a spring clean with a free, lightweight operating system called Jolicloud. Like Google’s Chrome OS, Joli OS takes a bunch of web-based apps and puts them all into one, easy to use and install platform that takes up a tiny footprint on your aging computer. With access to apps like Spotify, VLC, Skype, Soundcloud and storage options like Dropbox, Skydrive and Google Drive, you’ll be amazed at how much quicker everything seems on that creaky old Atom processor.
Have you got any tips for reviving your old
netbook? Share them in the comments below! [Source]
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