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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
Intel is removing drivers and BIOS for its old desktop boards so anyone running an old Pentium-based PC has four days to get hold of anything they might need.
The warning on Intel's download center page says:
End Of Life - This download, BIOS Update [RL86510A.86A] P21, will no longer be available after November 22, 2019 and will not be supported with any additional functional, security, or other updates. All versions are provided as is. Intel recommends that users of BIOS Update [RL86510A.86A] P21 uninstall and/or discontinue use as soon as possible.
Opinion on message boards is mixed, with some accepting that a 20-year support cycle is not terrible. But others pointed out that some industries like manufacturing will still be relying on old hardware to run parts of their infrastructure.
Posters on Vogon, a forum dedicated to ancient hardware and emulators that allow you to run old games on newer machines, questioned the move and how much space and storage Intel would really save by the housekeeping measure.
Various people are setting up their own mirrors and using archive.org, but the maker community noted that file names are not always obvious and downloading from mirror sites can be risky.
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Freeman on Wednesday November 20 2019, @05:02PM (1 child)
Seems like by the time you need to replace it you'll be able to get a Raspberry Pi that will do everything you need for $35. Depending on what you're doing, you might be good to go now with a Pi4 4GB. I'd recommend giving it a go some time, if for no other reason than those old PCs pull a whole lot more juice than a Raspberry Pi.
If you're in the USA, there's a sale on a few different models at Micro Center.
https://www.microcenter.com/search/search_results.aspx?Ntt=Raspberry+Pi&searchButton=search [microcenter.com]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 21 2019, @12:40PM
When people return them, they get put up as Open Box for 20% off.
So a $55 Pi4 4GB with $5 discount can suddenly become $40. I got mine before the discount but managed to get 3 of them as Open Box. Mix of 4GB and 2GB.