Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Revitalizing an Aging Notebook On the Cheap

Posted by timothy on from the but-I-want-a-wind-instead dept.

jcatcw writes "Brian Nadel's ThinkPad R50 just hit its fifth birthday, and the years haven't been kind to it. When it was new, the notebook was reliable and fast. Now it's slow and prone to annoying shutdowns. Is it a good investment to revamp a notebook that's worth about $350? It sure is, because this old notebook will get a new lease on life for about $125 — a bargain, considering what it could cost to replace." On the other hand, upgrading RAM, keyboard and hard drive don't get you a smaller (netbook-style) computer, a new battery, or the transflective screen on the Toshiba linked above.

4 of 261 comments (clear)

  1. Huh? by Bombula · · Score: 5, Insightful

    A 5-year-old notebook is worth $350? I don't think so. Hard for me to pay much attention to the rest of any article that begins that far off base...

    --
    A-Bomb
  2. Or battery life! by jkerman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    With a few exceptions, battery life just sucks with an aging laptop. and replacement batteries are either used up themselves, insanely expensive, or impossible to find.

  3. Wow..... by mr_nazgul · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I've been working on and in PC's for years and have never seen THAT bad a clog. Big dust bunnies are the worst I've seen...

    Where the hell did this laptop go? It looks like it sucked up a ferret (look at the page 5 gallery).
    http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9096720&pageNumber=5

    --
    Good.. Bad.. I'm the guy with the gun.
  4. Re:I don't think so by alan_dershowitz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When you can get a brand new and amazingly more powerful laptop for 400 dollars, five year old laptops are not worth 300 dollars. MOST people by that point sell the laptop rather than spend the money on a new battery, so let's say that I'm looking at one of these used laptops I see everywhere for 300+ dollars. I know that a new battery is going to cost me 80-140 dollars, so why the hell would I buy used when I can get a brand new one for around the same price?