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Ask HN: Please suggest uses for an old Mac

4 pointsby berkeshireover 4 years ago
Hi HN,<p>Long time lurker (2007 or so onwards), first time poster.<p>I have a Mac Mini, circa 2010, 2.4GHz Intel Core2 Duo processor(s), 2GB RAM, 320 GB storage. OS: Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard, cant be upgraded beyond this). Its from my iOS app development days.<p>Since the power usage by a Mac Mini is low [1], I am keen to run something good on it. It may not be on the network, more of a standalone.<p>I am not into mining. I dont want to run shared-computing-for-a-cause type of applications.<p>What can I run on this, other than dynamic photo frames.<p>Thanks for your time. Cheers. Stay safe.<p>[1]: https:&#x2F;&#x2F;support.apple.com&#x2F;en-us&#x2F;HT201897

2 comments

peterburkimsherover 4 years ago
Multi-boot it and use it for testing or legacy app development! I did that with a MacBook Pro 2007 that I was kindly given.<p>I&#x27;ve needed to use it to jailbreak &amp; downgrade iPhone 4S to iOS 6.1.3, and more recently, to build an app to use an old iPhone to generate a clean HDMI camera feed.<p>If your Mac Mini can run 10.4 Tiger, you&#x27;ll even be able to use some Classic apps (e.g. Age of Empires). There&#x27;s a couple of sites with some good software collections:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;macintoshgarden.org&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;macintoshgarden.org&#x2F;</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.macintoshrepository.org" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.macintoshrepository.org</a>
brudgersover 4 years ago
Sell it on eBay and donate the money to your local food bank.