What is old is new again
When the new school year rolled back around I wasn’t able to go back to work because of my heart surgery. While I was “busy” recuperating I set up my small laptop to use during the workday to take notes, email co-workers, etc… Unfortunately, even though it is a very small laptop, it proved to be too large and cumbersome to use day in day out. I knew from experience that I needed something bigger than my phone if I was going to be using it quite a bit every day. I also knew I didn’t want to start taking my new iPad to work everyday.
I have an older iPad, at least four generations old, which I have not been using much, if at all, the past few years. I dug it out a few weeks ago and cleaned it up. It will not run any of the newer operating systems or latest versions of any of the apps I need to use. It took a few days but I did find a way to install older versions of these apps and get things set up. It works nearly perfectly for what I need. It is light, the screen is bright and clear, and I can type my notes very easily.
I did some checking online and the most I can get for this old, obsolete, iPad is about forty-five bucks. When it was new, several years ago, it cost about $600.
Now I have had this brilliant idea that I can cleanup, fix up, and rejuvenate more of these old iPads for others to use in similar jobs. To be truly useful the iPads should be a version 3 or newer. iPad mini’s and air models would also work very well. If you have, or know someone who has, an old iPad that is just gathering dust because it is too outdated to be useful let me know. I might just be able to breathe life back into it and put it back to use.
All of this reminds me of the old saying, What is old is new again. As a society we have become very guilty of throwing away perfectly useful electronics because they are not the newest, or fanciest, version being used today. Maybe it is time to rethink this wasteful trend.