Thinkpads Forum

Hi all!

I have searched a fair amount and have the following comments and questions. The machine is a 600 2645 45U. It arrived yesterday.

It arrived with a whopping 64 megs (32 main + 32 in the slot) running Windows XP and had a Belkin G card that was not installed.

Being painfully slow, I formatted the drive and installed 98 to only find that there were no drivers for the Belkin nor a Netgear card I had - which meant the wireless was a no go. I opted to format the drive again, and install Win2k because the wireless drivers were available. I got the wireless to work - but it disconnects way to much to make it functional and with the present amount of memory, it would be faster driving to the library to look things up.

After reading what I could on the subjects, I ordered 2 - 128 mb IBM memory sticks and began to look at hard drives to see if there was anything that was faster than the one that is in this machine (I can hear the writes at a rate that sounds slower than my popcorn maker). About all I could come up with makes no sense financially - $100+ for a 7200 RPM 80 gig drive. Started to think about a flash drive - read what I could and have concluded that either I am stuck until the sticks arrive or maybe there is some type of wireless adapter that will work under win98. I suppose I could try and find win98se for which there are drivers for my 2 cards.

What drives are you all running to get this thing to perform in a way that makes it usable?

For those that are running wireless - what OS are you running and what type of wireless device?

Thanks for any help!
BR

Hi BigRed,

Welcome to the forums!

BIGRED wrote:maybe there is some type of wireless adapter that will work under win98. I suppose I could try and find win98se for which there are drivers for my 2 cards.

Win98se is a significant improvement over plain old Win98. I would recommend using Win98SE if you can. You should be able to find a copy for almost nothing, or get a copy from a friend for free. This is especially true with respect to wireless networking -- Win98SE made significant changes to the way that worked. I forget what those changes were, but I think that some of those things definitely work better under win98SE.

As for wireless cards, well I would just look for an old one. There are tons of cards that came with drivers for win98. Belkin cards? I don't even think Belkin existed when win98 was released. Though I am sure that there are some old Belkin cards that came with Win98 drivers. However, I would probably look for cards from 3COM/Megahertz/USRobotics. They used to be the king of PCMCIA networking cards back when everyone was still using Win98. I personally like the 3COM X-JACK PCMCIA wifi cards that have the antenna that can be pulled out when you want it and then discreetly inserted back into the card. That way there is nothing sticking out of the laptop to get broken or caught on anything when you are carrying it around.

Phil.

I too like Win98SE for legacy Thinkpads, but have also found that most new "g" class and above wireless adapters don't have drivers for 98SE. Just a couple of months ago I found some "b" class cards that had 98SE drivers, but they are all gone now.

Another option in a light weight Linux distro, like Puppy, DSL and others, that are pretty snappy and will more likely support new wireless cards.

Phil,

Thanks for the welcome. U.S. Robotics was my first modem - ran at 200 baud - so I smiled when you mentioned the names. Because my wireless is presently "G" I didn't think to look backwards. I do know that both my Netgear and Belkin cards have support for 98SE. So far I have not come up with a 98se source. Maybe once I get the memory up to 288 W2k might be reasonable to live with? Being that I started with DOS programs along time ago - I have found that each new version of Microsoft products especially Windows to be more and more of a resource pig - and even with the resources provided - many times is not crisp. So I might enjoy going backwards to a simpler time.

On the Hard Drive front, have any suggestions? I did some reading and so far I guess some have come away with slower computing when using a flash drive. I don't see how that is possible but... what do I know. If that is true then what drive model or series helps get these machines to a comfortable response / speed?

Thanks for the help!
BR

pkiff wrote:Hi BigRed,

Welcome to the forums!

As for wireless cards, well I would just look for an old one. There are tons of cards that came with drivers for win98. Belkin cards? I don't even think Belkin existed when win98 was released. Though I am sure that there are some old Belkin cards that came with Win98 drivers. However, I would probably look for cards from 3COM/Megahertz/USRobotics. They used to be the king of PCMCIA networking cards back when everyone was still using Win98. I personally like the 3COM X-JACK PCMCIA wifi cards that have the antenna that can be pulled out when you want it and then discreetly inserted back into the card. That way there is nothing sticking out of the laptop to get broken or caught on anything when you are carrying it around.

Phil.

Neil,

I know nothing about Linux. I suppose its a good time to investigate it as an option. I will need to run 3rd party widows based software and or web based java programs. My quick poking around seems to point to the possibility of it working. If you would please share from your perspective, the Linux benefits overall. Also are there any repetitive issues or frustrating problems running a Linux machine.

Thank you for help!
BR

Neil wrote:I too like Win98SE for legacy Thinkpads, but have also found that most new "g" class and above wireless adapters don't have drivers for 98SE. Just a couple of months ago I found some "b" class cards that had 98SE drivers, but they are all gone now.

Another option in a light weight Linux distro, like Puppy, DSL and others, that are pretty snappy and will more likely support new wireless cards.

I believe that your 2645-45U system should be able to support up to 416MB of memory. That strange number is a result of one of the slots registering only 1/2 of a 256MB "low density" module. The breakdown is like this: "Low density" modules are identified by counting the number of individual memory ICs on the module. For a 256MB modules, there should be 16 devices. A 128MB low density module will have 8 devices.

ref: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 81#p421581

BIGRED wrote:the Linux benefits overall. Also are there any repetitive issues or frustrating problems running a Linux machine.

My perspective is that of a Linux novice. The benefit on Linux is you get a modern OS, with all the security and performance updates, that work's well on older hardware. DSL can be loaded totally into RAM with only 128MB. Puppy can run in RAM if you have 256MB. But, I don't use Linux full time because, like you, I need to use software that only works on Windows, and I've found it difficult to use Wine. Plus, we don't have the resources to run Windows in VM on these legacy machines. Also, I have never been able to get sound to work on the early 600 series Thinkpads with Linux. It can be made to work, I just haven't been successful. That's the only real issue I've had.

I just installed win98se on a 770X yesterday that has 128MB RAM a 300Mhz CPU and a 4200RPM HDD, and it performs good. Slightly better than the same machine with win2k. But I could live with either OS. The machine I carry around with me is the 600E in my sig., that currently has a very stripped down XP install, and with the 288MB RAM, and 5400RPM HDD installed in it, runs very well for my application.

I was close to going that route - but had heard some say that they had memory issues surface and it got into the maker of chips etc. Being that this particular machine is low dollars to start with, I didn't want to buy parts that were not going to work and sit on them because it would be more cost effective to just move to a different performance level Thinkpad to start with. So I opted to go the route for that which will work for sure and happen to find IBM packaged 128mb 66 low density sticks. I hope that will make it run for my planned intent which is to use it to remotely monitor financial market information. If it will work then I can acquire a few more and place them where I would like to get a larger visual picture than can come across on a PDA size device. I am also trying a G40 but prefer the smaller footprint of the 600 for certain locations.

Thank you for the input.
BR

[quote="rkawakami"]I believe that your 2645-45U system should be able to support up to 416MB of memory. That strange number is a result of one of the slots registering only 1/2 of a 256MB "low density" module. The breakdown is like this:

Could web based java applications be made to work with Linux? That could be a work-a-round for my planned use. I think I need to slow down and take it in steps. Get the memory installed with my current W2K install and then see how it feels.

Neil wrote:My perspective is that of a Linux novice. The benefit on Linux is you get a modern OS, with all the security and performance updates, that work's well on older hardware. DSL can be loaded totally into RAM with only 128MB. Puppy can run in RAM if you have 256MB. But, I don't use Linux full time because, like you, I need to use software that only works on Windows, and I've found it difficult to use Wine. Plus, we don't have the resources to run Windows in VM on these legacy machines. Also, I have never been able to get sound to work on the early 600 series Thinkpads with Linux. It can be made to work, I just haven't been successful. That's the only real issue I've had.

I just installed win98se on a 770X yesterday that has 128MB RAM a 300Mhz CPU and a 4200RPM HDD, and it performs good. Slightly better than the same machine with win2k. But I could live with either OS. The machine I carry around with me is the 600E in my sig., that currently has a very stripped down XP install, and with the 288MB RAM, and 5400RPM HDD installed in it, runs very well for my application.