Laptops Get a Second Life as AI Workstations
That ageing laptop in your desk drawer may be more useful than you think. As artificial intelligence tools move from the cloud onto the device itself, manufacturers and tinkerers alike are discovering that older machines — once written off as too slow — can be repurposed as capable local AI workstations.
The trick is the new generation of compact, efficient AI models. They are designed to run on ordinary processors and modest memory, handling tasks like summarising documents, drafting emails and transcribing meetings without sending a byte to a distant server. A laptop from five years ago, given a memory upgrade and a fresh operating system, can now do work that once needed a data centre.
It is a welcome shift. Extending a machine’s life keeps it out of landfill and keeps your data on your own desk rather than in someone else’s cloud. Before you recycle that old laptop, it may be worth asking what else it can still do.
