Re: Linux on old laptop
By: Utopian Galt to All on Sun Nov 07 2021 07:08 pm

I finally converted my old i5-2410 to Lubuntu 20. I was tired of waiting over 5 minutes for my windows 10 laptop to boot up and at least the pc
will have another 5 years of life that I could use for email or web
browsing or even telneting to bbses. I thought this would be better for
the plannet than to buy another laptop right now.

I know this is over 6 months since you posted, but I just want to echo how incredible it is to extend old hardware in this way. I used elementaryOS, a Linux flavor known for its simplicity and out-of-box resemblance to macOS, and it revived a circa 2008 MacBook Pro that I am using for this very use case: browsing the web, checking email, and telnetting into BBS'es. Strongly recommend it.
-=- Kaelon -=-

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Re: Linux on old laptop
By: Kaelon to Utopian Galt on Sun May 01 2022 02:07 pm

Re: Linux on old laptop

Not Linux, but I use OpenBSD under an old Atom N270 netbook
with:

- cwm
- tmux
- mpv+yt-dlp
- sfeed
- nsxiv cli tools
- mednafen/nethack/slashem/nfrotz
- catgirl
- bitlbee and
- lynx/links.

For cursed JS sites I use luakit.
Specs:

\- -/ os OpenBSD 7.1
\_/ \ host 0493200000001C00000300000
| O O | uptime 9h 47m
|_ < ) 3 ) pkgs 441
/ \ / memory 615M / 1015M
/-_____-\


Most resources are being used by Links -g rendering a huge page
but fast as hell.
With the previous OSes (XP or 7 starter), the netbook would be a
doorstopper.

-- Unix junkie --

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Is mpv better than vlc when it comes to video playback? vlc struggles to play videos on my twelve-year-old laptop.

... He who laughs first probably got the joke

Re: Re: Linux on old laptop
By: unixl0rd to anthk on Wed Aug 03 2022 08:22 pm

Is mpv better than vlc when it comes to video playback? vlc struggles to play videos on my twelve-year-old laptop.

In my experience, there isn't much difference, but maybe. MPV seems to work the best on my laptop, and it is more than 12 years old (Its still 32 bit).

But hi-resolution videos are going to struggle from the computational demands.

---
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On 05 Aug 2022, Boraxman said the following...

But hi-resolution videos are going to struggle from the computational demands.

primary question basically is if your laptop has hardware accelerated
decoding .. for example h264 playing fine and h265 chopping and playing like hot garbage. since older laptops wouldn't support the newer codec.

vlc has some settings to enable/disable/adjust the decoder. on occasion the software decoder works better (for very early divx stuff, but perhaps for other instances)

... A book misplaced is a book lost

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/12/25 (Windows/32)
* Origin: cold fusion - cfbbs.net - grand rapids, mi

Is mpv better than vlc when it comes to video playback? vlc struggles to
play videos on my twelve-year-old laptop.

Last evening, I was watching HD videos using vlc on my atomic pi (running debian 11) without issue. I tried watching them on mpv and the video and
sound "stuck" a lot.

The atomic pi uses a more modern CPU than a 12 y/o laptop, but I think it is only single-core and it does not have much memory, so it might be a fair observation. Your mileage may vary, though.


* SLMR 2.1a * A restless eye across a weary room...

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Re: Re: Linux on old laptop
By: Dumas Walker to UNIXL0RD on Fri Aug 05 2022 09:45 am

In my case, I have this ~/.config/mpv/config file for an Atom netbook

ytdl-format=bestvideo[height<=?420][fps<=?30][vcodec!=?vp9]+bestaudio/best vo=xv
audio-pitch-correction=no
quiet=yes
pause=no
vd-lavc-skiploopfilter=all

For youtube, I use these little tools:

git://codemadness.org/frontends

once compiled, I puta a yts func in ~/.profile such as:

yts()="/src/frontends/youtube/cli "$@" | less ; }

yts "whatever"

then I select the link, I paste it to mpv in a terminal, and
the video plays fast on this potato.



-- Unix junkie --

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fusion wrote to Boraxman <=-

On 05 Aug 2022, Boraxman said the following...

primary question basically is if your laptop has hardware accelerated decoding .. for example h264 playing fine and h265 chopping and playing like hot garbage. since older laptops wouldn't support the newer codec.

My 2020 Roku TV has a bit of a problem with h.265. Not a show-stopper, but h.264 plays much more smoothly.



... The exception also declares the rule
--- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
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Re: Re: Linux on old laptop
By: poindexter FORTRAN to fusion on Fri Aug 05 2022 07:31 am

fusion wrote to Boraxman <=-

On 05 Aug 2022, Boraxman said the following...

primary question basically is if your laptop has hardware accelerated decoding .. for example h264 playing fine and h265 chopping and playing like hot garbage. since older laptops wouldn't support the newer codec.

My 2020 Roku TV has a bit of a problem with h.265. Not a show-stopper, but h.264 plays much more smoothly.

that's pathetic. you should return it.
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Re: Re: Linux on old laptop
By: unixl0rd to anthk on Wed Aug 03 2022 08:22 pm

Is mpv better than vlc when it comes to video playback? vlc struggles to pla

I would not know if it is "better", but I rarely find any issues playing video files with mpv or mplayer.

--
gopher://gopher.richardfalken.com/1/richardfalken

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Re: Linux on old laptop
By: anthk to Kaelon on Mon Aug 01 2022 12:51 pm

Re: Linux on old laptop
By: Kaelon to Utopian Galt on Sun May 01 2022 02:07 pm

Re: Linux on old laptop

Not Linux, but I use OpenBSD under an old Atom N270 netbook
with:

- cwm
- tmux
- mpv+yt-dlp
- sfeed
- nsxiv cli tools
- mednafen/nethack/slashem/nfrotz
- catgirl
- bitlbee and
- lynx/links.

For cursed JS sites I use luakit.
Specs:

\- -/ os OpenBSD 7.1
\_/ \ host 0493200000001C00000300000
| O O | uptime 9h 47m
|_ < ) 3 ) pkgs 441
/ \ / memory 615M / 1015M
/-_____-\

Most resources are being used by Links -g rendering a huge page
but fast as hell.
With the previous OSes (XP or 7 starter), the netbook would be a doorstopper.

-- Unix junkie --

Pretty awesome setup. Never heard or seen OpenBSD on an Atom!
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