Anonymous
The most important reason to keep the old hardware running is environmental. E-waste is quite a serious problem, caused by a modern-day attention-deficit society that needs to upgrade computers every so often to “keep in fashion” or whatever.
Having a bit of extra CO2 in the environment is much less damaging than the waste, and is in fact a non-issue.
About 10 years ago I entered a store that had a marketing flyer which said something like: “Did you know that 3 years is 97 computer years?” I guess my systems are all medieval. My laptop is 330 years old, and my desktop is 750 years old. I have a 32-bit Thinkpad which is 460 years old.
In a time where software bloat is celebrated and revered, antiX does give a breath of fresh air that you can still use older hardware to engage with the modern world of technology.
32-bit systems are still fairly usable for other purposes, including managing collages of drunken selfies and pictures of half-eaten sandwiches and pies to stick on Instagram.
Let’s put it this way, Intel stopped selling the i386 and i486 CPUs in 2007, and Microsoft stopped selling Windows for Workgroups 3.11 in 2008.
there’s still no good reason against having a ‘simpler’ 32-bit version and a ‘more sophisticated’ 64-bit version.
Other than consistency and reduced effort in development and testing.
Windows doesn’t do it. None of the BSDs do it. Other Linux distros don’t do it. Why should antiX do it?