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User profile for user: Dustin.LindenSmith
Dustin.LindenSmith Author
User level: Level 1
11 points

Is my 2007 17-inch MacBook Pro usable anymore?

Hi everyone,


I just unearthed my old 17" MBP from an old closet and booted it up for the first time since 2015. It looks and works perfectly fine, except of course the OS is 10.6.8, the machine has 2 GB of RAM, and it doesn't look like I can update Safari, Chrome or Firefox past their 2015 levels (meaning that SSL doesn't work and most websites no longer load properly).


Aside from using it as a really heavy movie viewer (its DVD drive still works great!) or a word processor, is there anything useful I can do with this gorgeous old goat now that it appears to be fully obsolete? Is it worth trying to install Linux on it for playing around with or something? I really hate to drop it at the recyclers, but it legit seems to be completely obsolete.


Thanks in advance!


Dustin

MacBook Pro

Posted on Jan 14, 2021 5:59 PM

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User profile for user: Limnos
Limnos
User level: Level 10
418,681 points

Posted on Jan 14, 2021 7:23 PM

In theory you could upgrade it to El Capitan except the RAM is really too low to comfortably run that. Apple says 2GB minimum but when they say that they really, really mean it. I ran Mavericks with 4 GB and it wasn't enough. You could upgrade the RAM but that means $. El Capitan is now relatively old in the Apple world but it does let you run relatively modern browsers.


I think you have named some uses for it and maybe it would be something you might want to take if you go on vacation and want something that if it gets lost, stolen, or damaged you won't feel too bad.

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User profile for user: Limnos
Limnos
User level: Level 10
418,681 points

Jan 14, 2021 7:23 PM in response to Dustin.LindenSmith

In theory you could upgrade it to El Capitan except the RAM is really too low to comfortably run that. Apple says 2GB minimum but when they say that they really, really mean it. I ran Mavericks with 4 GB and it wasn't enough. You could upgrade the RAM but that means $. El Capitan is now relatively old in the Apple world but it does let you run relatively modern browsers.


I think you have named some uses for it and maybe it would be something you might want to take if you go on vacation and want something that if it gets lost, stolen, or damaged you won't feel too bad.

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Is my 2007 17-inch MacBook Pro usable anymore?

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