Old laptop recommendations for Linux?

https://sopuli.xyz/post/41979335

You can always set up dual boot on the windows desktop. Be warned though it is a slippery slope… I did that to test it out and then just didn’t log back in to windows.
You’ll probably want a second boot drive too. Windows updates like to eat GRUB sometimes.
Not booting up Windows means no updates. 🤷🏻‍♂️
Someday… someday.

yep, this is how I made my transition into linux

Set up dualbooting windows 7 and Linux.

I think I only booted into 7 once in the following year, to recover some stuff off the drive before nuking it.