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The can of worms we opened when we learned of the server switched off after eighteen years and ten months' service is still wriggling, as a reader has contacted us to tell of nearly 30-year-old laptops still in service.
Reader "Holrum" says he has "a couple dozen Toshiba T1000 laptops from the mid [1980s] still fully functional (including floppy drives)".
The T1000 was introduced in 1987. [...] The machine was one of the very first computers to use a clamshell form factor. [...] It also offered a rather archaic LCD display, as illustrated.
[...]The machine ran MS-DOS 2.11 on a ROM [and] came with a colossal 512kB of RAM [...] and a single 3.5-inch floppy drive.
Holrum says the T1000s are taken offline every few years for just the few minutes required to replace the NiCad batteries and give them a clean before they are returned to duty as process monitoring terminals.
Previous: Beat This: Server Retired After 18 Years and 10 Months
(Score: 2, Insightful) by shortscreen on Monday February 15 2016, @06:50PM
I bet that all of those laptops put together use less electricity than one modern 'gaming' PC.
You probably can't even buy a laptop now with power requirements as low as one of these.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Monday February 15 2016, @08:05PM
I think you'd be surprised. Per the first reference I found, the Toshibas have 60 watt power adapters. Assuming 24 of these, minimum, that's 1440 watts. A good deal more than the gaming PC I'm typing this from now. I mean, could you build a gaming PC that uses more than this? Sure, if you are a PC ricer. I haven't seen anything I can't run at 50 FPS though with my single video card and a ~500W power supply.
Comparing these to modern laptops is tricky, because generally they're not expected to be plugged in 24/7. The MBP I have charges the battery in about an hour of being plugged in, and then it lasts for hours under heavy load. It has a 75 watt power adapter, sure (which is obviously far more than it needs, given how fast the battery charges) but it's only being used maybe 10% of the time.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 3, Informative) by fnj on Monday February 15 2016, @09:10PM
All the laptops I've owned and most I've seen, have AC adapters rated at about 65 watts. And their average power consumption is generally about 10-20 watts. So your estimate of total average power consumption is probably at least three times what it should be, and maybe six times. So it isn't 1440 watts; it's closer to 360 watts.
A lot of gaming PCs have 1000 watt supplies or even 1500 watts. Of course they aren't averaging 100% power, either, but at worst the 24 Toshibas are not using substantially more power than a gaming PC.
Of course 24 Beaglebones (Raspberry Pi's as a poor substitute if you MUST) only use an average of about 24 watts altogether. You could run over 300 of them for the power you suck down with either the array of Toshibas, or a gaming PC.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 16 2016, @04:00AM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toshiba_T1000 [wikipedia.org] --> power supply 9 VDC, 1.1A, or ~10Watts...
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday February 16 2016, @07:10PM
That's a lot less than I would have thought. One could compare it to a raspberry pi, but you'd also have to consider power for a screen as well. Raspberry Pi Power Usage: "400% CPU load, 1x USB 64GB SSD, 1250 mA (~6.25W)." http://www.pidramble.com/wiki/benchmarks/power-consumption [pidramble.com] Raspberry Pi Display (7"): "The display used 2.23 Watts. (0.43 A at 5.19 V)." That would make a total of ~8.48Watts. The real difference is that the raspberry pi has vastly superior processing power. Sure, it may not have the track record of the Toshibas, but those Toshibas won't last forever. Assuming the Pi Zero ever becomes available for purchase at a reasonable quantity for the original price, that might even do the trick. Assuming you could run them headless, the Raspberry Pi would make even more sense. Though, if not the Raspberry Pi, something else could do the trick. How about PocketChip http://getchip.com/pages/pocketchip [getchip.com] or an Orange Pi http://www.orangepi.org/index.html [orangepi.org] or something totally different? It is negligent to use such old hardware for systems that you rely on. Assuming their loss would be of little consequence, then perhaps it's time to remove them from service. Otherwise, preventive maintenance is a thing.
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: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday February 16 2016, @07:12PM
Bah, I forgot to include the source for the comment "The display used 2.23 Watts. (0.43 A at 5.19 V)."http://hdmipi.com/ [hdmipi.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: 2) by shortscreen on Tuesday February 16 2016, @05:19AM
according to this, it is 10W
http://freegeekvancouver.blogspot.com/2010/12/toshiba-t1000-teardown.html [blogspot.com]