It would be nice to have a USB on an old laptop. Would for instance this NEC one work?
I'm going to say no, due to the fact that most of those pre pci 486 laptops will have a PCMCIA slot, which looks kinda identical to a cardbus slot but isn't.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PC_Card
PCMCIA is more like a ISA bus extension while Cardbus is more like a PCI extension.
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https://www.vogonswiki.com/index.php/Serial_port
If somewhere in the documentation for the PCMCIA card it says 16-bit, then it's compatible with pre PCI laptops.