"No settings, no nonsense" is the default for the MANY programs that exist to serve the "distraction free writing" niche.

General wisdom in author circles is that you write THEN edit. Having spell check and other tools only hampers the creative process.

Darkroom/WriteRoom (and the dozen+ similar programs created over the past decade or two) http://jjafuller.com/dark-room/ offer zero nonsense, zero setting, zero hassle, text entry programs geared towards authoring a book. They get rid of pretty much everything on screen except for text and background. No UI, no features, nothing. Just the way it should be.

I've used them for NaNoWriMo for years and years.

I was mostly thinking along the lines of what if his machine dies? Instead of hunting around for old obsolete hardware it would be easier to find modern hardware that you've adapted to and configured to be as productive as your old hardware.

Because the newer stuff probably has at least a few features that will make him more productive in the long run, once he spends the initial time investment to configure the software for his needs.

There is a distinct possibility that modern word processors or text editors actually would be worth the transaction cost, as judged by Martin himself, even though he currently predicts otherwise.

Or, why write books when you can just dick around and pretend to be an 'author'?