Thinkpads Forum

Found the following on Craig's List locally. Thinking of picking it up

A31p (I emailed for the 7 digit product code, don't have it yet)
P4M 1.7 GHz
512MB RAM
60GB Hitachi HD
Radeon 7800
15" display with 1600X1200 resolution (I believe this is the UXGA. Correct me if I'm wrong)
DVD/CDRW combo
Internal Bluetooth
Original wireless replaced with a Broadcomm card

It has some minor cosmetic issues (Two small chips on the casing) and DOES suffer from the memory slot issue.

Comes with AC adapter, one good battery, and one questionable battery.

$200

Thoughts? This would be a second machine for me, so I wouldn't need more than 1 GB of RAM. My T40 does the bulk of my computing, so this would be more for play.

Thats a stellar deal if the LCD is in good condition. Take it!

I would say its a good deal, if the lcd is good I believe the A31 only officially supports 2x 512 so if you can see and test with a 1gb so-dimm first, all the better. Naturally, there is a risk but in the end it is really up to you. good luck if you decide to buy it

darn he beat me lol

2X512? Weird. No worries. The more I think about it, 512 would probably do what I need. I'm waiting for a response from the guy. His ad says a ton of people have flaked on him before meeting, so I'm hoping to pick it up in the next couple days or so.

Check the LCD and look for red hue on boot.

Also, make sure you boot it at least 10 times in a row to see if the screen garbles.

BTW, A31p will take 2Gb RAM, so even with one bad slot you can run 1Gb which is cool.

If all the above passes, it's a good deal.

Thats a great deal.I would make sure the LCD in in good shape.
Most of thease A31P's are 5 years old now or more.They may have the red tint to the screen.Check for that.
But mostly make sure the video chip is running good.
Play with the system for a while ,playing a DVD movie,Diffrent pic's on the screen,make sure theres no lines,dot's,or anything thats not normal.
That would be the biggest thing i would look out for.
Most everything else like ram,hard drive,cd-rw,even the backlight can be replaced,But a A31P with a bad GPU (video chip) problem will most lickly need a new motherboard,that can cost 200.00 or more on e-bay.
Also the A31P's can handle upto 2 gigs of ram.I have mine running 2 x 1gig chips now.
I'm sure George on here can give a few more pointers on what to look out for....Afterall he's the "king" of the A31P's
*you posted a reply George as i was typeing He He...*

Of course, even if the CCFL is going, you could send it over to our forum friend jamiphar. You would still have a nice deal, even after paying him to fix it!

Well crap. Thanks for all the info everyone. Looks like the ad was pulled, so it's no longer available. [censored].