Reviving Chromebooks with Ubuntu
anarchosolarpunk.substack.com
anarchosolarpunk.substack.com
Apple have not paid anything as far as I know to the community that are working on drivers to make Linux run on their M1 and M2 Apple Silicon Macs. Most of the software the powers the Chromebooks is open source.
A little bit idealistic, but we should make Apple accountable of their "eco friendly" image, we already have enough e-waste, to keep dumping good hardware to the trash because it not longer has support from Apple, despite working perfectly fine and safe with other OS like Linux.
At very least, manufacturers should be asked to unlock things and provide documentation to let the community support devices. It's incredible the amount of devices that have perfectly fine hardware but are crippled due to the lack of software updates.
BTW, just because you do not use street lamps (as you use a car) means others still need sidewalk/pavement + street lamps.
After selling your streetlamps to cities far and wide, you have decided that your lamps won't be supported anymore, and their critical control software won't even be updated for security issues.
Instead of leaving them unsafe to use, you need to make it so the buyer can continue to use them safely, even though the light output may be reduced or they might not be as cutting-edge (eye-friendly wavelength, for example) as your new offerings.
Everyone is free to update to the new lamps if they want to, but there should be no artificial reason to force them to do so.
I think the suggested laws to combat this would be that companies must allow users to take control of their own devices once official support is no longer available. Paying enthusiasts to create a distribution of Linux for the device would be a cheap way of ensuring your devices fit that kind of law. It's just a way of saying that devices must be reusable, even without further manufacturer support.
I had an original ipad, and it was almost unusable within a year of me buying it because of forced software upgrades it couldn't take.
Apple devices are notoriously painful to recycle properly.
7 years ago or so I installed 32-bit Edubuntu (IIRC) on some old Atom netbooks for my little cousins, and it was very straightforward.
But back then there was more 32-bit support still.
One needs to keep in mind though that, depending on the device, some features might not be fully supported (like custom touchpad drivers).
My machine keeps going nevertheless. I only use it for light browsing while I commute, so I'm not that bothered about lacking OS updates. As long as it turns on, connects to WiFi, and opens Firefox, I'm content.
Many of today's Chromebooks will be supported through 2030. It even works on Apple desktops and laptops!
My girl friend's school is having to dispose of about 300 chromebooks for precisely this reason. Most are still functional, but now unsupported. They would be totally usable if they weren't being deliberately binned by Google.
This is an environmental crime, as is a lot of support ending the useful lives of devices. These externalities are created by companies who make huge profits, and don't have to deal with what they have created. I've thought this for years, but part of the problem is that everyone is convinced they need to use windows (they don't), and everyone likes new and shiny.
> environmental crime, as is a lot of support ending the useful lives of devices.
It is the same like all large companies selling their windows 7 or 10 device (after 3 years of leasing) or TV. Ideally there could be FOREVER updateable windows version with only security support/patches - basic version.
The WORLD business model is bad for environment/world.
At least all these Chromebooks will be sold in eBay (for cheap) via resellers that are used well by linux community.
https://support.google.com/chromeosflex/answer/11513094
As a concrete example: I have a Thinkpad L440 which is certified for Flex and receives support until 2026. The L440 runs any Linux X86 distro fine (EFI or legacy Bios).
I realized if I wanted an (automated) testable staging environment, I would need to "duplicate the stack," in a sense: a test firewall and a production one; a test router--and a production one.
I.e. once official support ends the company must release datasheets, schematics, PCB designs, a FOSS bootloader and firmware, etc. - so that old devices can be repaired and re-purposed.
It'd increase the threat of cheap clones - but that's not necessarily a bad thing either.
Many of these devices never had these to begin with, and the firmware came from the SoC manufacturer not the gadget manufacturer. That'd be a huge chain reaction rippling through the supply chain; unlikely.
I can't even imagine the amount of money Apple, NVidia & Intel would sink into lobbying against needing to disclose internal datasheets.
I wish, but wishing isn't helping much. In the meanwhile, I buy Framework laptops...
If we're talking old ones from 2010s
I had better luck with a 2.16 GHz celeron (Toshiba Chromebook 2)
Other thing is say you visit YouTube and the tiles don't all immediately load in, that's an example of lowering performance (because time moves on, web grows).
Most of what you're attributing to "chip aging" is software bloat and assumptions of e.g. hardware acceleration for GUI animations.
(The rest is mostly increased thermal throttling because the cooling systems generally do get worse over time. But not by that much.)
edit: granted for the TCB2 I was able to run a VM in it (virtualbox even) so that's something.
In general I am not the person to drop $2K on a new MBP or something. I like buying old flagships, the issue is their battery is usually not that great anymore and the replacements are usually fake (bad capacity/faked eeprom).
Last edit... even a past flagship though starts to suck eg. I have a 2015 i7 MBP and you can start to notice it struggle (dev work again) regarding getting hot/fans, slowing down. it is clean
No chip aging there. Don't blame the chips for things they didn't do.
Can it open some websites still yes.
Maybe I missed the point of this article "revive".
edit: another random anecdote, I bought a palm top that was released in the late 90's and while it's cool/nostalgia, that's another example of a pretty much useless thing in today's needs/software-hardware compatibility
idk, I hoard a lot of my old phones... I feel bad just discarding them since they still work... but what are you going to use them for, maybe wire them up and try to use them as a cluster idk.
Cringe