But don’t try to add modern peripherals and memory.

You might have to find and fix a fault.

If you can do a jigsaw, you should be able to mix and match the internal components from other old machines to produce a working computer.

The machine would probably benefit from a good clean.

Air is pulled through the computer to keep it cool where all the wires act to filter the dust and dirt. Be ready for a shock. The inside can very dusty. If the machine has lived in a dusty environment it might be worth fixing the upholstery brush to the vacuum cleaner!

A computer has 2 fans:

One keeps the power supply cool. It draws air through the computer and blows it out of the rear. You can often inspect the fan but remember the dust will have been filtered by the components inside. Don’t leave 3 ½ “ disks in the machine or the CD drawer open, as this provides an easy path for dust, which might clog the disk, and means that the airflow is not passing over the intended components.

The second fan sits on top of the processor chip. These can be very noisy and people have been known to discard their machine, expecting it to crash at any minute, because of the noise made, especially at start-up. The early fans are serious dust traps. As dust accumulates, they get noisier and less effective. If they do not do their job of cooling the processor it will age and fail. So it is worth cleaning this fan.

There are limits to what you can do to upgrade an older computer. The technology has moved on leaving insuperable compatibility issues.

This means you will probably have to find used components if you have to replace anything. And if you start moving components about, you will need some special software called drivers.