art of laptops on eBay

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verktyg · #1 Post by **verktyg** » Sat Oct 02, 2004 5:46 pm

My T20 died. Probably mobo problem, wont start, did ALL of the recommended fixes. IBM want $425 to replace the board with 90 day warranty.

Found seller on eBay who specializes in T2x and TP 600 parts: artoflaptops

It looks like they buy up TPs and part them out.

They offer:

700Mhz T20 bases with CPU, fan & mobo for $119
850Mhz T21 bases with CPU, fan & mobo for $139
1.3Ghz T23 bases with CPU, fan & mobo for $285

Has any one here dealt with this seller?

Chas.

verktyg · #2 Post by **verktyg** » Sat Oct 02, 2004 5:47 pm

BTW, seller offers 6 months warranty on used mobos

Chas.

ychandrani · #3 Post by **ychandrani** » Sat Oct 02, 2004 8:54 pm

Well, it'd be good if you posted a link to the ebay site, so that some of us can look at it and make a suggestion!

JHEM · #4 Post by **JHEM** » Sat Oct 02, 2004 10:23 pm

Chas,

http://stores.ebay.com/Art-Of-Laptops_W ... 3aSTQQtZkm

Been around on eBay for about a year and a half or so. Lots of product, pretty good prices in most instances.

I don't believe I've purchased anything from them, but I could be wrong.

Regards,

James

verktyg · #5 Post by **verktyg** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 12:01 am

ychandrani wrote:Well, it'd be good if you posted a link to the ebay site, so that some of us can look at it and make a suggestion!

Sorry, didn't want it to look like spam....

Chas.

verktyg · #6 Post by **verktyg** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 12:05 am

Thanks. I think that I may try upgrading my T20 with a T23 base, 1.13Ghz CPU and T23 mobo. I'll need to get PC133 RAM.

Chas.

ychandrani · #7 Post by **ychandrani** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 7:47 am

I went and searched them on ebay and their prices look good. As always with Ebay take a look at the ratings by other buyers. In the little time that i spent reading customer ratings, I did not come accross anyone writing back about a repair experience with them. If you are able to do it, then you can probably buy the system board base and swap it out yourself. If you are going the DIY route, then be sure to ask them the extent of the warranty/coverage for the base.

There are other parts vendors for the Thinkpad online such as http://www.acsparts.com/; http://www.bluestarusa.com/ and http://www.thinkpadmedic.com/default.asp. But their prices seem much higher than that offered by art of laptops. Also with these vendors, you are on your own or you will need to find a repair-person comfortable with working on a Thinkpad.

Now to the mea culpa: I have a dead T21 P-3 800 that I inherited from a friend. It too has a dead system board and a warranty that expired June 30th, 2004. The machine stopped working jul 7th!

Its now mine to keep since the friend went ahead and got himself a t42p. Over the past week, I have been looking around to see if it can be revived without spending a bundle on it. Haven't decided if its worth it, but it'd be nice to get it working as a backup machine. I'd be curious to know of your experience if you do decide to revive your t20 through art of laptops.

JHEM · #8 Post by **JHEM** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 8:46 am

ychandrani,

WRT your dead T21, have you replaced the CMOS battery as the first step in restoring life to the system?

Reseated all RAM?

Reseated the CPU?

What are the symptoms?

Regards,

James

ychandrani · #9 Post by **ychandrani** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 9:52 am

James,

The first thing I did was change the CMOS battery, took out the min-pci card, reseated memory, reseat the CPU, emptied out Ultrabay 2000 (i.e. took out the CD-RW/DVD Combo drive) and tried to boot up.

The symptom is a momentary flash of the power on light, but thats about it. This was true before I did the above steps. After this, I had the machine diagnosed by a local IBM warranty service center here in NYC. They came back with an estimate of $675 plus labor for replacing the system board.

Since then, I have found this store on Ebay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... eName=WDVW

and have been contemplating buying the board and paying the $59 to get it replaced. The dealer and I are both in NYC. Only concerns for me are a)time, which is scarce in my life and b) his rating is 98.4%. But he's been around on Ebay since 1999.

The other option is to buy the board from an IBM parts vendor (price range is $225 to $575), plus the a set of new screws (since I understand that IBM recommends not to reuse their nylon coated screws) and tools (which I don't have) and do it myself. Most of these vendors give 30 day coverage on the board. I guess if it works, I will have a spare laptop for little more than $300.

What do you think?

Yogesh

JHEM · #10 Post by **JHEM** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 10:22 am

Yogesh,

That is an excellent price for the MB and installation. I'd go for it.

WRT their feedback, a moment or two reviewing it will show that the vast majority of negatives were cases of the buyer not being able to read!

Regards,

James

ychandrani · #11 Post by **ychandrani** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 11:55 am

James,

Thank you for the encouragement. I think I'll go for it. I have written to the vendor for more details about the repair option.

Cheers,

Yogesh

JHEM · #12 Post by **JHEM** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 5:24 pm

Yogesh,

Please keep us advised as to how you do or don't make out with this repair station. Wouldn't hurt to let them know we're watching them!

WRT your X31 burner, get an outboard USB2.0 one! You can get an 8X outboard burner for about a third of what it would cost for the 2X IBM internal one!

Regards,

James

ychandrani · #13 Post by **ychandrani** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 5:54 pm

James,

I have every intention of sharing any good news about the repair shop! Why keep a good deal to oneself? As for bad news......thats another matter.

RE the external burner you mention, which one in particular do you recommend? I took a look at the Liteon (aka Litesout, after I had one of their desktop CD-burners actually started spewing smoke! a couple of years ago) at Newegg for $129. Don't ask me about the smoke, but I had this one desktop from a local no name shop that gave me so many headaches, that all my friends were convinced that I ought to have been or become a luddite.

Ever since I have been converted to thinkpads and always been happy with them.

Is there a slim DVD burner with a universal power supply (i.e. usable here and in Africa and India) out there that you'd recommend? I tend to travel a lot and would prefer to leave the X3 Ultrabase at home.

JHEM · #14 Post by **JHEM** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 8:20 pm

Yogesh,

Most of the better portable burners take their power directly from the USB ports, although almost all have the ability to use an external wall-wart.

Name brand, but expensive at $229: http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?id=10101 (Doesn't hurt that it was designed by Dr Eng Ferry Porsche!) Street price is around $200 and it burns at 8X, but it weighs 3.3LBs.

If you must have a lightweight one, then you're going to give up speed as you give up weight. At one LB the Pioneer is among the lightest:
http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/pna/p ... lComponent, but you're back down to 2X speed.

If weight and power aren't a consideration, just pick up a cheap 5.25" Firewire/USB2.0 case and throw in whatever burner strikes your fancy. You can build your own 4X external burner for less than $100. Start shopping here: http://www.pricewatch.com/

Regards,

James

Regards,

James

ychandrani · #15 Post by **ychandrani** » Sun Oct 03, 2004 9:05 pm

James,

Thanks again for your patience and pointing me in the right direction. The lacie looks the most appealing both in terms of specs and aesthetics. Its still not out in wide distribution, but i will look at the price engines in a week or two. FYI, the datasheet at lacie says the drive weighs 335g, presumably without the AC adapter.

http://www.lacie.com/download/datasheet ... lim_en.pdf

Thanks again.

Yogesh

verktyg · #16 Post by **verktyg** » Thu Oct 14, 2004 11:56 pm

JHEM wrote:Chas,

http://stores.ebay.com/Art-Of-Laptops_W ... 3aSTQQtZkm

Been around on eBay for about a year and a half or so. Lots of product, pretty good prices in most instances.

I don't believe I've purchased anything from them, but I could be wrong.

Regards,

James

I was watching the feedback on this seller for a week or so before I bought anything because they were not getting back to me on my inquiries.

They're falling appart - 26 negative responses this month. Lame excuses that his company has split up what ever that means.

JHEM · #17 Post by **JHEM** » Fri Oct 15, 2004 12:52 am

Chas.,

Out of curiosity I bid on and won two small items from this seller, a 32GB HD and some T series HD caddies, about $100 altogether.

Other than taking a very long time for the items to ship and never being able to contact the guy by email, everything eventually arrived fine.

I've been through several company breakups so, the recent negative feedback notwithstanding, I'd probably buy from him again if he gets things together.

Regards,

James

art of laptops on eBay

art of laptops on eBay

BTW- seller offers 6 months warranty

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