Z Car Barbie

I want to upgrade my dinosaur laptop, and, no, I don't want to buy a new one. I'm one of those people who gets attached to things, and would rather keep something until it completely croaks beyond repair than buy new. I currently have 3 desktops and this laptop (all are 3-15 years old). I've upgraded my desktops, and they're now awesome, so the laptop gets it next. I'm not familiar with the laptop components though, but can probably figure it out once I get in there, since I had no problems figuring out my desktops.

Here's my laptop specs:

HP Pavilion N3410
OS: Windows ME (I don't care if I have to put Win 98 on it; ME has to GO! I hate it!)
Processor: AMD K6-3
RAM: 120 MB
HD Space: 4 GB
CD-ROM (if this one is an RW, it doesn't work - I want one that writes)

What I'd like to do is get rid of the ME, make it faster (the processor bogs down a lot), give it at least 8 Gigs and get an RW. I have my desktops to store my primary files, so the laptop is more of a "play toy" and I don't want to pour much money into it. I cannot find anything on HP's site as to upgrades, compatibility, etc. So, can someone tell me which upgrades I can/should make to satisy my needs for this puter and where I can buy them for a reasonable price?

snwbrderphat540

no one upgrades laptops cuase no one takes them apart to put junk in the,,,///well someone might...but who i ask? my mommy offered to get me a laptop....so im like...mmm....ok.

hoov100

ive been eye'n the HP zd8000 fairly sweet lappy... should be good for just about anything...

entropy31

the HD and optical drive should be upgradeable. laptops use 2.5" HDs, which can be purcahsed at a computer store. i dont think you are going to find a new drive that is only 8gb. there are plenty of them for 40-50 bucks that are in the 40gb range. as for optical drive, thats a bit trickier. different manufacturers use different ways of installing these. you might want to find a place with used hardware and scavenge a drive from a similar computer. as for performance, RAM. get more. your computer supports a max of 512mb. fil it up. older notebooks do not take kindly to processor swaps, so i dont suggest that. for OS, if you really want something that isnt loaded down, go LINUX. seeing as that isnt practical if you want to use most commercially availlable software though, go with XP Pro SP2. and if you dont already, use firefox as your browser, it is much more secure than IE. scan your system regularly for spyware and viruses. defrag your HD from time to time.


or do what i did, and buy a new one . after buying HD, ram, OS, and optical drive, you wont be too far away from a far superior machine out of the box.

snwbrderphat540

nerd alert....
haha jp. that info can be helpful....if i understood it

Z Car Barbie

Cool, thanks, Ent! Ok, let me see if I got this right:

* I need a 2.5" HD. 40 G's would be great - will try to find one
* Optical drive - what's that?
* Processor - keep what I currently have?
* I can add more RAM, up to 512 MB max.
* XP is good - never used LINUX, so I'd rather stick with what I know - lol
* RW CD-ROM - any compatibility issues, or will any notebook drive do?

Oh, and I defrag, sweep and run spyware scans on my puters regularly, but thanks for the suggestion - makes a HUGE difference in performance, for sure!

NismoPick

I know you said you don't want to buy a new one... but for less than the price to upgrade, you can get a killer laptop. www.craigslist.com is the heaven of computer shiznit. There's always 1 or 2 year old laptops going for $300-$500 fully loaded.

RodMoyes

Laptops are rarely worth upgrading. the components are way too expensive when purchased individually. In a case like what you have presented, I can't see bothering with the upgrade. Suck it up and just by a new or "newer" unit. You can find a good used lappy that will smoke what you have now for a lot less than it will cost you to make any real improvements to your current machine.

Rod

EDIT: DAMN IT NISMO!!!!! QUIT BEATING ME OUT ON THE RESPONSES!!!!!

entropy31

optical drive=cd/dvd drive. uses a laser to optically read information, hence the OPTICAL.

Fast240Z

I completely agree with entropy, with the cost of upgrading your laptop, you might as well just go out and buy a new one. I work at Best Buy, in Computer Sales, and we have some killer deals on laptops this week. We have quite a few Centrino laptops with the Intel Core Duo in them, and a brand spankin' new Intel Core 2 Duo, which is 40% faster and more efficient than any other processor at this time. And what else is nice? These notebooks can be fully loaded for less than $1000 (that includes notebook, case, software, accessories, etc), and if I remember, the notebooks are going for less than $799.

skittle

actually i thing xp will bog it down more. if you want your windows to run faster get either 95 or 98 on it. the newer versions of windows takes more memmory to run. the min for win xp is 256mb and thats still really slow. i'd go with 95, yeah i know its really old but you still have the gui inertface and also have the option of DOS. It really depends on what you are going to do with it. Personally i would downgrade the O/S to 95 upgrade the mem to 512MB and the hard drive to at least 40GB get a readwrite dvd (not that expensive any more) and such.

Coolie

Hi Barbie...I just happen to be a nerd...ok the title says Senior Software Support Specialist...STOOPID title...
Just means I run a little team of nerds heehee
Laptops are really not worth trying to upgrade, you will have limited ability to upgrade memory and HDD and thats basically it.
To go for as long as possible you would be best using Win 98 SE...would be the best fit for what you have, XP will load but will be unusable basically.

Let it die girl...go on, pull the plug heehee

Z Car Barbie

Thank you so much for your input, guys! I really appreciate it! Although I know it might make sense to buy a new puter, I just have this thing about becoming attached, and still feel I can upgrade for less than I can buy new. I could be wrong, but I'll check the prices, now that I know what to look for. I'd really like to just upgrade this one, cuz it's only my play toy - mainly just for internet browsing and visiting the sites I moderate. I use my desktops for everything else.

Thanks, Skittle ... I was wondering about the XP vs. 98 myself. I don't have the 95, but do have 98 SE. That should be ok, right? And, I sooo miss my DOS functions! Just when I had it down pat, Windows came out.

i8acobra

You can most likely pick up a used laptop much newer than yours for less money than it would cost to upgade yours.

skittle

Your Very Welcome... I Knew One Of These Days I Would Put My A+ Certification To Use...lol

Z Car Barbie

Very good use indeed. Hmmm, I'm looking at CD/DVD R/RW's on New Egg right now ... am I supposed to be looking for, what they call, "Slim"? I don't see anything else that would even remotely fit my laptop.

skittle

It Would Probably Be Better In Your Case To Get An External Dvd Burner. Its Just Plug In And Play, And Then You Don't Have To Break Into The Case To Put The New One In. They Go Pretty Cheap As Well

Z Car Barbie

Ummm, I'd rather have an internal, cuz I wanna keep everything as compact as possible. I gotta tear into the puter anyway to replace the other components.

Ok, I'm looking at memory now. Can anyone tell me whether my puter has 1 or 2 slots? I dunno if I should buy one 512 MB card or two 256 MB cards. If it has two slots, then I know I'll need to split it up into 2 cards.

snwbrderphat540

i can help you get over the attatchment....toss it out the second story window

entropy31

i bet she has USB 1.1. if so, an external would be a little slow.

Z Car Barbie

LOL, Snowy!

snwbrderphat540

well, you shoudl compromise with yourself. get a standalone in your car and use your attatched computer for the tune (extravigent i know) and get a new comp for the work horse. or put the old one aside for soem sort of use liek that later.... just make it a utility or secondary comp. it doesnt have to get retired or thrown out...

hoov100

a little slow?? she would propably die of old age trying to use USB 1.1 with the new atachments these days..

Fast240Z

If this is the case, there are PCMCIA USB 2.0 expansion cards. Keep in mind that if you downgrade your system to Win98 or lower, you may run into some issues with the dvd burner and compatibility. I recommend Win2k myself for a computer that isn't too beefy, but someone wants a somewhat up to date OS. I ran it on my own pc until I finally took the plunge to XP Pro.

As for your memory, go to www.pny.com/configurator, follow the prompts, and it will tell you the specs for your machine. You can also remove the ram access door on the bottom of the laptop and physically count the slots. As a rule of thumb, most laptops have two ram slots, unless they are the cheapest notebooks available at the time. The manufacturer will also distribute the ram evenly between the two slots to cut down on cost. As an example, if your notebook has 512mb of ram, it usually has two 256mb modules installed instead of just one 512mb module.

entropy31

i dont think that 98 supports usb2.0. it has trouble with 1.1.