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electric lazarus

round up your dusty devices.
your derelict drives.
their new lives are yours to give.

Digging through boxes, we surfaced a few old laptops and tablets long forgotten. Getting ready to recycle them, it occured to me they could still be useful.

Contents:

• Surface Pro 2
• 2016 Macbook Pro 13
• derelict devices

Surface Pro 2 -> Samba server

it powered up after a bit of charging and seemed to work pretty well. at first, I was thinking it might be a handy little portable computer, but the lid issues changed my mind. maybe a little file sharing server was the way to go. i upgraded Windows as far as it let me, but 10 wasn't going to cut it long-term. after a little searching, Ubuntu seemed like the obvious choice.

i went through (roughly) the steps below to turn it into a little file sharing server. it's now happily humming and sharing our files. hope this helps someone else do the same.

current issues

• [ ] suspend behavior via closing keyboard super buggy - disabled that behavior for now
• [ ] closing keyboard only locks system once due to modification below

instructions

0. prep
   • update the current OS and BIOS as much as possible before wiping
   • wipe the computer - securely and slowly if you're into that kind of thing
   • disable secure boot - turn off surface, hold vol up button, turn on, disable secure boot and tpm
1. create install drive (USB)
   • on another computer, download Ubuntu
   • flash image to USB drive via Balena Etcher
   • boot from USB drive - turn off surface, hold vol down, turn on, select drive
2. install Ubuntu
   • boot to install drive - turn off surface, hold vol down, select drive
   • follow install instructions - you do you
   • restart and set up - keyboard and touchpad work, but a little janky
   • sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y
   • probably reboot
3. go to linux-surface and follow instrunction to install kernel
4. fix autorotate
   • sudo apt install gnome-shell-extension-manager
   • open gnome extension manager and install screen-rotate by shyzus
5. fix for keyboard lid (kinda)
   • sudo nano /etc/systemd/logind.conf
   • change lid behavior to never sleep (your call, but I went with lock)
6. set up Samba server
   • find a good tutorial for this. it's funky
7. enable ssh via openssh probably
   • handy for remote updates
8. party

2016 Macbook Pro 13

this one was pretty far gone. can't even update or make MacOS install media without doing a bit of hacking. decided to try it with Linux. i don't really know what to do with this one yet. anyway, here's where I'm at with it.

current issues

• [ ] no touch bar (or function keys)
• [ ] super sticky keyboard - someone spilled oranged juice in it
• [ ] does not wake from suspend - implemented workaround
• [ ] fix or replace keyboard
• [ ] replace battery (it's bad)

instructions

0. prep
   • update the OS and BIOS if you can - it's a pain
   • wipe it
1. create install drive (USB)
   • on another computer, download Ubuntu
   • flash image to USB drive via Balena Etcher
2. install Ubuntu
   • boot to install drive - don't remember the specifics, gonna have to search it up
   • follow install instructions - you do you
   • restart and set up - touch strip doesn't work
   • sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y
   • probably reboot
3. fix for keyboard lid (kinda)
   • sudo nano /etc/systemd/logind.conf
   • change lid behavior to never sleep (your call, but I went with lock)
4. now what?

derelict devices

a list of devices i have not brought back yet. ideas are welcome

• Dell XPS 13 - screen busted, has trouble booting
• Dell G7 - not in bad shape, but small primary hard drive and Nvidia GPU
• old apple TV - probably a paperweight, but open to ideas

CREATED 2025-06-13