i got a laptop thats almost as old and still runs fine. sure it cant be used much for gaming but for running the OS and light pc tasks, this thing gets the job done quite well. mines an early gen corre i7. long as it had quad core it should still be good. also help if you upgrade to nvme or ssd.
that said, if i were to get a laptop at that $500 budget point that the op mentioned, i'd consider upping that budget to at least $650 and get one of the newer gen ryzen 4000 series cpu ones. budget laptops with those chips will cost $650 starting out but it gets you the latest tech. if you need to stick to $500 then i look at the best specs you can get at that price.