X20 still worth it ?

[soulfire]

So I got an old X20 from work for free...

Need to replace the hard drive which shouldn't cost too much, but my main concern is that I don't have an ultrabase. I only have the docking station which means there's no way I can install anything on the thing without forking out for antiquated hardware.

I've seen similar X20 models on Ebay for £175.00 so with all the hassle of sourcing, purchasing and installing new hardware I'm wondering if it's worth the effort...

I've surfed the forums and installing a fresh OS on the X20 without the ultrabase seems to be problematic at best !

Can anyone suggest a concise guide on if this is possible with minimum effort ?

Any suggestions are appreciated.

[asiafish]

I've seen the X2 Ultrabase with optical drive on eBay (USA) as low as $50. If in otherwise good condition, an X2 at that price (I'd pay a bit more for one with DVD) would make sense. While you won't sell the X20 outfit at much of a profit over the price of hard drive and X2, you will have a very nice little system that is still capable of doing about anything you'd want to do on an ultraportable.

[tfflivemb2]

I paid $45 shipped for the X2 base, here in this forum.

It really is a minimal cost to have a nice machine like the X20. My wife loves hers. I traded her up from a Compaq M300 (smaller) to an X20 so that we could share drives, and because it was a Thinkpad.

The X20 isa really nice machine, and I can't believe that you were lucky enough to get one for free....consider yourself lucky.

[Red_October_7000]

I got my X20 for the price of a little USB data plug. Ultrabase, WORM drive (or some such that can write optical), FDD, and a power supply. Only regret is that the screen is only 800x600 and many, many web sites are formatted for 1024x768 or better. Otherwise, after putting W2Kpro on it, it's a fine little performer for an ultralite the size of one of those marble notebooks you dread from your high school years.

[em500]

Installing Windows XP (presumably) without the Ultrabase isn't too dificult. The way I do it is first make drive bootable and install DOS (best is the DOS from Win98, you can easily download a bootdisk for it) on it. You can do this in another laptop which does have a cdrom, or in a desktop with a cheap 2.5"->3.5" adapter. Then you copy the \i386 folder from the XP installation CD on the HD. Now put the HD in the X20 and it should boot in DOS, where you can manually start the XP installer (winnt.exe).

It's convenient to make at least 2 partitions and leave one in FAT32 with the DOS bootfiles from Win98. You can then reinstall anytime by puting the \i386 files on this partition and activate and boot from it. Even better if you have Ghost.

[soulfire]

Thanks for all the feedback guys.

I was on the verge of chucking the thing out but you've convinced me to resurrect it !

Cheers,
Vernon

[tfflivemb2]

Well, I'd most certainly have been willing to take it off your hands.