Is your old computer costing you more than you think?

I have not yet found a circumstance when its more economical to re-purpose an old desktop rather than buy a $200 netbook at walmart. Electricity is cheap here, but it still works out to more than a buck a watt-year.

I'm even to the point where I cast a suspicious eye on 20 watt IDE drives vs just buying a new 3 watt laptop drive and an adapter and tossing the old drive.

A netbook with a pair of 1TB shirt-pocket USB drives that acts as my server here uses just 18 watts when the drives are spinning, 11 when they spin down.

Even if the old dell desktop is free, buying the netbook is cheaper for a single year of use. Sometimes, you can't afford stuff thats free.