Do you or someone you know have an old computer lying around? And you can't afford upgrade it or to buy a new one running Windows version whatever? Well, don't worry. That old computer isn't as useless as some people will tell you. Using software called Breadbox Ensemble, you can cheaply turn any PC into a powerful productivity tool. Once you use Breadbox Ensemble, you'll never look at an older computer in the same way again.

But just what is Breadbox Ensemble? Based on an operating system called GEOS that was popular in the late 1980s and early 1990s, it's a small (a full installation weighs in at under 10 MB) and fast suite of incredibly useful programs. While small, Breadbox Ensemble is an easy-to-use graphical user interface that mimics the look and feel of the Windows desktop. All programs and functions are a mouse click away.

Breadbox Ensemble is a product of the Port Richey, Fl.-based Breadbox Computer Company. For the longest time, the company developed software for the desktop version of GEOS and various devices that ran the operating system. A couple of years back, however, Breadbox bought the rights to the GEOS operating system from its original developer, Geoworks. They then re-packaged desktop GEOS as Breadbox Ensemble.

What You Get

The applications that make up Breadbox Ensemble range from basic to powerful. You can use the basic applications for keeping track of names and addresses, for scheduling events, and for managing your files. The more advanced programs in the Ensemble arsenal are Writer, Spreadsheet, and Artist -- the suite's word processor, spreadsheet, and graphics programs. With Writer you can create newsletters, reports, brochures, and letters. Spreadsheet is the perfect spreadsheet for home use. Not only can it perform all basic functions that you'd find in Excel, Spreadsheet can also generate charts and graphs. Artist is a drawing program that you can use to produce camera-ready art for the documents you create with Writer.

What really makes Breadbox Ensemble useful are the programs that lie in between those extremes. Programs like Banker, a Quicken-like personal finance program, and Banner, for creating large signs. There's even a Web browser and e-mail software that can get you on the Web quickly. These applications give Breadbox Ensemble the kind of utility and flexibility rarely found in other software.

While aimed at schools, Breadbox Ensemble can be a perfect fit for home users or even home businesses on a budget. And it costs far less than a new computer or an upgrade. It's true that none of the programs can match the power of most Windows applications. But they don't have to, because Breadbox Ensemble conforms to the 90/10 rule: 90% of users only use 10% of a program's features.

The Good and the Bad

What's refreshing about Breadbox Ensemble is that it takes into account the fact that users of software have different abilities and needs. Unlike other applications, which present users with the same, often confusing interface, Breadbox Ensemble lets you adjust the skill level of its applications. There are five levels -- ranging from beginner (which displays only basic functions) to custom (which lets you choose the features you want). As you become comfortable with an Ensemble application, you can change the skill level with a mouse click.

As for running on old hardware, I installed Ensemble on two desktop systems that I bought in the early and mid-1990s, and a pair of notebook computers of similar vintage. Each of them had between 4 MB and 16 MB of memory and small hard drives. Ensemble ran surprisingly quickly and smoothly on every computer -- faster than any comparable application on my wife's notebook running Windows XP or even my new Linux laptop.

On the downside, Breadbox Ensemble can't handle files created by the latest Windows office suites. With few exceptions, the import and export filters are for older DOS programs. Long-time user Jens-Michael Gross says that the "Web browser is only useful for offline reading or 'importing' documents. Email and other applications are useful for some people but still not refined enough to match anything in the Windows world."

What the Developers and Users Have to Say

With the computer market dominated by companies like Microsoft and Apple, and with the growing popularity of Linux, many people would think that software like Breadbox Ensemble is a quaint anachronism. Frank Fischer, president and CEO of Breadbox Computer Company, strongly disagrees. It's not about keeping an older technology alive -- Fischer says that his company believes "GEOS remains a highly competitive and viable alternative for many different applications."

As for those who think that GEOS is dead and it's a waste of time to develop for it, Fischer replies: "We don't listen to those people and they more than likely never made a difference in the success of GEOS in the past, and I doubt they will in the future."

The greatest strength of Breadbox Ensemble, according to Fischer, is that it "offers more value than anything else on the market today. We're second to none in our packaged pricing to the educational market. Ensemble and our educational software still runs extremely well even on an old 386. This makes one-to-one computing absolutely feasible, even for the poorest schools, school districts, states and countries."

Users of Breadbox Ensemble, and other versions of GEOS, love it because it's small, fast, and does most (if not all) of what they need to do.

Andreas Bollhalder has been using GEOS since 1992 to do everything from writing letters to creating technical drawings to keeping track of various items. He says that Breadbox Ensemble covers "99% of my needs in creating documents." He adds that if he tried to keep up with Microsoft Office, "I would have spent five times more money then with Breadbox."

Robert Leone got bitten by the GEOS bug in 1998. He was always more-than pleasantly surprised at its incredibly low system requirements. Leone told me: "I wonder how many old school district and home user hand-me-down '386 and '486 computers had their useful lifetimes doubled by the availability of Breadbox Ensemble (or GEOS in one form or another)."

I'm one of the Ensemble faithful, too. I've written a number of articles with it (including this one), and even cobbled together Web pages in Ensemble's HTML editor. Using some of Breadbox's software, I've also created presentations, cataloged my personal library, and balanced my budget -- things that I wasn't supposed to be able to do with a notebook from the mid-1990s.

Breadbox Ensemble is a great way to extend the life of an old computer. It won't appeal to someone who demands every feature from the programs they use. But if you you want to compute and don't have much money to spare, you'll find that Breadbox Ensemble does everything you need it to do.