T30 Restoration

[DOSBrony]

I am doing a summer project, which consists of restoring, and possible repurposing my Thinkpad T30. I also have a Dock II, which will be my means of adding any needed PCI cards, and charging, since I don't have a properly working charger.


The restoration is going to:
Replace the battery
Replace the little red mouse nub
Repair a couple of cracks on the case
Restore the factory settings using the restoration discs (If anyone knows where I can download or buy the XP version, tell me, though I prefer a download)
Cleaning the laptop
Replacing a missing hinge lock
Replacing the Hard Drive
Replacing the RAM
Installing a Wi-fi card
Replacing the Heatsink and Fan


Here's where y'all come into play... Suggest a purpose for the laptop! I'd like to hear some of your great/creative/useful ideas!

Specs:
1.8ghz Pentium 4M
512mb RAM
16mb ATI Radeon 7500 mobility
40gb HDD
Windows XP SP3
I can put in a GT 8400 512mb graphics card, thanks to the Dock II's PCI slot.

[Penultimate]

I use a tiny Lenovo Ideapad as my main, general purpose computer,
which is frankly the most durable laptop computer I have ever owned.

I will never again remotely consider a Dell or Compaq, because both of them have given my huge problems with laptops that were gently used and often did not even leave me desk at home.

The Dells have a built in circuit in the AC charger cord that after you bend it too often is designed to fail and makes you computer unusable on purpose until you pay Dell for a new and expensive proprietary AC charger..
The Compaqs are like pulling teeth to get any drivers for any features that were not avail when you bought the computer and the screens tend to have problems with backlight failures in my exp.

I have a old 701c Thinkpad that still dual boots DOS and Win98 on its orig HD, and came across a 10 dollar Thinkpad T23 a couple days ago that was under a pile of electronic junk at a thrift shop and it booted right up to a (corrrupted) Windows XP orig installation and also has what appears to be the orig HD dating to 2001.

I intend to use my discount T23 basically as a dedicated DVD burner and ordered a 'slim' Multi drive and adapter to replace the DVD-rom drive that came in the T23 with a DVD 8x writer.

I will post back here tomorrow (drive should arrive then) and relate if it works with the adapter.

My only surprise was to find that you can buy a slim bay DVD 8x burner drive for 13 bucks, but a ultrabay 2000 DVD 2x burner drive is going for 60 bucks! (I guess they made a lot more 'slim' multi drives than they did ultrabay 2000)

[RealBlackStuff]

Your next surprise will be when you find out that an Ultrabay Slim drive does not fit/work in a T23.
The T2x requires an Ultrabay 2000 drive, that has a different connector...
Not to mention that other 'slim' drives have a SATA instead of a PATA/IDE connector.

[Penultimate]

Your next surprise will be when you find out that an Ultrabay Slim drive does not fit/work in a T23.
The T2x requires an Ultrabay 2000 drive, that has a different connector...
Not to mention that other 'slim' drives have a SATA instead of a PATA/IDE connector.

Yeah I found that out when I was browsing the thinkpad wiki here while Ebay shopping for a cheap drive. I eventually ordered a ThinkPad DVDRW CDRW Multi Burner Drive 39T2679 (slim) for $13 bucks, but it still has not arrived today.

I also ordered a brand new in the orig box Slim drive to Ultrabay 2000 adapter that is sitting at home that is supposed to allow a Slim drive to work in my T23 and that was only about $12.

The cost of the adapter+8x slim drive were much less than buying a orig ultrabay 2000 2x DVD-RW drives so I will be a happy camper if this works because it is a minor cost and much better promised performance than the 2x drives.

[jronald]

I have the recovery CDs, plus the downloads from MS to save you 1 1/2 days at DSL speed from downloading. Nominal cost involved. If you need them let me know via PM.
I also have plenty of plastics left over from refurb days, when i gave the completed machines away.

Ron

[cadillacmike68]

Good luck with it all.

When you burn DVDs (or CDs), Burn at the lowest speed the software has for the best results.

Where did you get the Ultrabay Slim to UB 2000 adapter. I'd like another and i need to find another Ultrabay Enhanced to UB 2000 adapter (broke mine!)

[Penultimate]

Good luck with it all.

When you burn DVDs (or CDs), Burn at the lowest speed the software has for the best results.

Where did you get the Ultrabay Slim to UB 2000 adapter. I'd like another and i need to find another Ultrabay Enhanced to UB 2000 adapter (broke mine!)

Yes.. you are absolutely correct. My disc issues with the standalone players went away once I cut the burn speed down to 4x.

I got the adapter off of ebay and the seller was great.. really fast shipping and cheap. The adapter is very flimsy manufacture and what I would describe as 'delicate' plastics.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-ThinkPad-Sl ... 2ec88a9ca5