I have a Dell 600 laptop installed at my parents home, I connect to it via Teamviewer and could activate both the USB camera and audio remotely. My father has alzheimers and i check in with him from work or when I am travelling.
I have converted a few old, very old laptops into digital picture frames and given them as gifts to family and friends, they are configured to download pictures automatically from my server and this way they can follow along with my adventures and get regular updates and take a part in my life regardless geographical location.

My latest conversion is a Toshiba portege 3010CT – 266 Mhz with 32MB RAM, installed with DSL (Damn Small Linux) and placed in a ready to use IKEA “RIBBA” frame that cost $4.99. This way I do not need to build a PC holding unit around it, the frame functions as the housing unit, 2 hours later you got yourself a digital picture frame.

Home automation server is another attempt I have done with test software, when the free trial was over I did not bother to purchase the software.

If your laptops have built in WIFI or if you have a WIFI NIC for that model, then you can use it as a wireless base station.
I am using an old Compaq Armada 7730 with a Compaq WL100 PCMCIA as a wireless base station and a firewall filtering sniffer.

There is a vast variety of usages, imagination is the limit.
Enjoy your attempts.

Mmoi5

Regarding why the sync tool is useful for Outlook, it’s because email sycned over the Google MAPI sync tool is done much faster and more elegantly than via IMAP.

That’s an interesting comment regarding Google Apps, that you feel it’s ahead feature wise. I generally don’t care about collaboration stuff like Sites & Video. Calendar is important, but only at a personal level, not for group collaboration of schedules.

I’m not sure why you feel that Google Apps has a better webmail and calendar. As far as calendaring goes, I feel that Outlook is pretty good, and for webmail, I’m really not a fan of Google’s threaded view and prefer the traditional per message viewing. Also, OWA in Exchange 2010 now works on all browsers equally well, so that’s pretty neat too.

Someone pointed me earlier towards SherWeb, a Hosted Exchange company that seems to have better rates than Rackspace, and I’m definitely adding them into the mix.

One thing that’s important to me is iPhone/iPad and Apple Mail sync support. A lot of my family members are using these devices and it’s crucial that it works with Apple products too.

I must say, that the choice between Google Apps and Hosted Exchange is a very difficult one! I do like the Google feature set more than Exchange, but almost all of the feedback I have is that Google’s support stinks (unless you have enough users to make them care, which I don’t) and that Exchange does email better than Google, and email is by FAR the most critical part of the solution. Plus, GA Sync doesn’t support Outlook 2010, which is a problem for me.

Regards,
Ali

Interesting write-up. I’d say Rackspace is an interesting option, but as far as features goes, Google Apps is definitely ahead. I guess if you just want an Exchange host, Rackspace is a good option, but if you want a good webmail, calendar etc. Google Apps is far ahead.

Also, why would you need the sync tool if you are not planning to use the web-interface? Wouldn’t it be easier to just use an IMAP migration tool (assuming your old email provider support that) like Yippiemove and just move the emails once.

If you are planning to use the web-interface, just copy all the emails once, and then deal with contacts and calendar manually. It’s just a matter of exporting and importing.

At least I’m not alone! I have no idea what I will do with still working HP, but I am sure I can find a good use for it.

Have gone through the same situations you cited, both in trying out the Ubuntu netbook edition as well has the desktop one but none worked on my very old Acer, but then I reinstalled XP home and handed it over to the Kids. Mohammed is now doing fine with it and so is my 4 year old Khadija who has found out new ways for watching the nursery rhymes googling and she annoys Mohammed over the laptop that I gave to him.
I think kids are better off with XP then Win 7 and its more friendlier to them….Ubuntu is not for them yet.
BTW, Its khadija’s 4th B’day tomorrow night.
Oh one more thing I would highly recommend Juz30 software (just do a google search) for your daughter for memorizing Quran and do download husaree for her.

Every other major bank appears to support Firefox but not HSBC. This stops me using a linux boot disk for internet banking, which provides far greater security since with the more recent development of stealthy trojans like Zeus you should assume that any PC used for general browsing is compromised and you are probably not the only one controlling it.

Typically a back door allows a greedy intruder to piggy back on your own valid banking session to makie their own transfers out of your accounts at the same time.

This is not good enough and sooner or later will prove a major embarassment to HSBC when an wide scale incident occurs and they can’t offer their customers the easiest and safest solution of a trusted boot disk.