T42 Internal Power Failure

[zippinbye]

Newbie with a first post here. I have been "into" Thinkpads for about 6 years, when I bought a NIB T42 w/ 15" screen, one of the last pre-Lenovo units. I'm by no means a "techie," so please bear with me for some elementary questions. It went down last summer ... just typing a Word doc and it went to blue screen with a barage of fast-moving messages that included nasty things like "memory dump" and "internal power failure." That's the last thing I ever saw on the screen. It won't boot. The only sign of life is the A/C plug and battery charge annunciators on the lower screen frame. I had stumbled across a sweet T60 on Craigslist for $200, so Plan B was in hand. But due to recent upgrades (80 GB HD, 2 GB RAM, big battery, new DVD drive) I hate to cast the T42 aside. I'd like my 10 year old girl to end up using it. I am assuming that the power failure was something catstrophic, likely the motherboard. I'm not into blowing cash on diagnostics, but I'm thinking of the parts-changing approach. I've found several T42's on eBay, from about $70 that boot to BIOS but are missing the HD, to fully-functional for about $120. I'll probably grab one and put the best of the two together, and have some good spare parts on the shelf. Here are my speciifc questions: 1) Good idea? 2) Are all parts swapable if I end up with a 14", or should I stick with a 15" (that's my goal, but if the price is right ...)? If the 14" is no problem, would it make any sense to consider a T41 or T40? 3) Similar to question 2, is there any component compatibility to a T60? I know the battery is different, for sure. 4) And finally, might upgrade from XP to Windows 7 (buying an OEM to get rid of Vista on one computer). Thanks for your help!

[RealBlackStuff]

I saw your other T60/T42 post.
I have some great R52 machines with 15" XGA.
Apart from different RAM (R52 uses cheaper DDR2 PC-4200 RAM), all other parts from your T42 would fit in the R52.
You'd find plenty buyers for your 'old' 2x1GB RAM to cover/offset the cost.
You may not be aware of this, but T40/T41/T42 machines with ATI graphics could develop (or already have) problems with loose GPU and/or Southbridge chips.
These R52 machines (twins of the T43) have integrated Intel graphics, and do not have any of these problems.
See The Board Room link in my signature for more details and price.