@ All - thank you for a better understanding of microkernels. I learned more than a few things there.
@ Luke, re Win - it is one of two Win boxes I maintain. The other is a Dell XPS 15Z with the more odious Windows 10, which I need because I use a graphics application called CorelDRAW.
I have attempted the use of Inkscape - but, "bless their hearts" (as one often says, in my geographic location) they have no idea how to make a human-usable UI. The one time I tried it, it gave me fits and left me with far more questions than answers...
I maintain the Win7 netbook because of a promise I made to a close friend - he spent his childhood in front of various computers with the Commodore logo on them - and he recently gave me that collection, with tge request that I image the rather extensive disk library that it came with, so that if he ever wanted to fire up an emulator and muck around like a kid again, he could. Normally this requires a real DOS computer, and specialized software and cabling - as Commodore's disk drives used a different encoding scheme, at the magnetic level, from what PC drives use - but I recently acquired a device called a "ZoomFloppy", which enables the use of more modern equipment to do the PC side of the job - you still need a Commodore drive, mind you, but you are no longer mired in the world of the early 1990s (at the latest!) otherwise, which dramatically reduces the number of potential points of failure.
...as for why I'm using the netbook for anything else - that comes down to three things. One, I like sitting in my front room right now better than spending all day at the desk in the bedroom - which I desperately need to clean off. Two, one of my DIY laptops recently died spectacularly, and I'm awaiting parts for a rebuild. Three, the netbook offers a convenient stand-in for the dead laptop and is easily set up in my front room, whereas relocating the much larger, remaining DIY laptop from the bedroom desk would be a considerable effort indeed.
Also - I do not, in the given context, understand the term "marshalling" as you used it - could you elaborate, please...?