HP DC5100 SFF

Yea the old tax computer. I mentioned it recently in another thread. Well noticed it has both EIDE "PATA" connections and SATA connections on the motherboard. So borrowed a cable and hooked up SSD out of my daily driver computer with MX19 on it to unused SATA.

Its really amazing how well it runs for a computer from 2005. This is unique computer with P4 processor and 4GB DD2 RAM. Its single core but hyper threaded so can do 64bit. And apparently is "turbo" meaning it can overclock itself for brief periods to over 3Ghz.

But most interesting... I tether to phone for my internet. Well as has happened past year, I tend to run out data towards end month and am throttled down to basically fastest dialup speeds. Meaning SUPER SLOW. This creates odd situations. I for instance have a Proton Mail account. The free version only accessible via web. And even on my faster daily driver computer, with throttled data speeds, it can time out before Proton Mail site loads. I sometimes have to rinse and repeat several times to get in. BUT with same MX19 on same SSD run on this old computer, yea its still slow to load but it loads every single time in one effort. No having to beat the door down with repeated attempts. And has me scratching my head, how this old single core computer running a modern 64bit system does this when multicore faster computers cant???

My only guess is that it somehow overclocks at just right moment. ???? But thats just wild speculation. I really hadnt thought much about this computer until I was trying modern linux distributions to see how they did on several old computers. I had to reseat the RAM in this one just to get it to boot. It generally only used once a year to run tax software. And cmos battery was shot. Replaced that. Has original slow mechanical hard drive with unactivated win10 for tax software. I locked win10 down as much as possible to keep resource demand as low as possible, seriously was surprised win10 would even install on it, but the tax software had started sniffing for XP and refused to run on XP. Win10 is greedy if you let it serve two masters as designed. Didnt really want to boot any linux except Knoppix via usb. It would boot from dvdrom but SUPER SLOW. I just happened to see it had SATA connection and decided to try and see if that made difference. It does. And using an SSD makes huge difference. I updated Firefox to latest version on the win10 installed to mechanical hard drive and it was sluggish. Fine on MX. Kindle on WINE even works pretty well. Seriously for day to day mundane stuff, this could still work as a daily driver. i am sure it would bog down doing processor intensive stuff. But maybe prefer this antique to some of modern low end tablet computers. It is a very tough old computer, nearly twenty year old if you can believe it.

Ok, tax sofware runs in WINE but wont activate or install updates. Its fine on win10 but win10 is history in 2025. So...

Looked and found a n-lited hacked version win11. Only a 1.6GB download. Tiny compared to official version. Burned iso to dvd. And booted it from the old DC5100 with P4 processor. The installer is in Portuguese. Shows option to install "Ingles" version though. So off to the races. Being hacked it doesnt check for newest ultra security chip stuff. Nor other supposed hardware necessities. It also let me use local account. Apparently the official versions insist on setting up a Microsoft Account, though stupid work around I read is just give them a fake email address.... Oh well But no it just set up local account on the page with the dropped ice cream cone image (cause it couldnt go online). And after installer did its final tweaks....

It booted into win11 desktop. Ok, its in Portuguese. Of course, suspect the hacker removed all language packs except his native Portuguese. So I am stumbling around. But not hard to guess, its mostly a reconfigured win10. Little nicer looking, but seriously not worth a whole generational windows change. It really is just another win10 update. Guess M$ coffers were getting low. Plus lot hardware manufacturers arent thrilled that you can run win10 on nearly 20 year old computers that just wont die. Cuts into sales.

Well with some hacks around obvious unnecessarily arbitrary installation rules, win11 will run ok on nearly 20 year old computers. Least for basic stuff, this isnt a powerhouse gaming computer or anything. Since I really havent slightest interest in win11 as daily driver, this is fine just to run tax software once a year for next ten years if I live that long. Software in English is still in English when you run it, just windows interface that is in Portuguese.