Help me upgrade my T41p workstation ?

[djpharoah]

Well I am currently rocking a totally piece built T41p laptop with these specs and I run it hard daily on AC and batteries during lectures doing AutoCAD, Solidworks + Cosmos, Office and music etc.

Specs:
- 1.5GHz Banias (I know I know)
- 1GB DDR333
- 60Gb Hitachi 7200rpm
- 1400x1050 LCD: with insane amount of stuck horizontal lines on the bottom (i have lost approx 1400x225 pixels). this makes working on cad applications a pain in the rear.
- battery: i have 2 x 6 cell and 2 x slim drive batteries.

I love my thinkpad and feel its the perfect size and has the video power I need with that firegl T2 128mb card.

So to upgrade - is it worth it? I would need a power cpu or move up to a dothan as it helps with number crunching and battery life. 60gb is fine for now but I am guessing it would be expensive. The LCD is the main focus of my upgrade - would it be worth it? Should I get a a refurb from ebay or get a new one? I have already confirmed that the vidoe card is fine as I give presentations and the output works fine.

Thanks

[ajkula66]

djpharoah wrote:

I have already confirmed that the vidoe card is fine as I give presentations and the output works fine.

That doesn't mean that the card and motherboard are 100%...VGA output that you're referring to is analog, where one going to the LCD is digital, and I have seen many ThinkPads where the output was fine but motherboard was still bad.

Even if your board is fine, it's not worth upgrading the machine IMHO. A good T42p can be had for $500-550 these days, even T43p if you're lucky. So, part out your machine once you've bought the new one and you'll save a surprising amount of money.

Just my $0.02

[djpharoah]

djpharoah wrote:

I have already confirmed that the vidoe card is fine as I give presentations and the output works fine.

That doesn't mean that the card and motherboard are 100%...VGA output that you're referring to is analog, where one going to the LCD is digital, and I have seen many ThinkPads where the output was fine but motherboard was still bad.

Even if your board is fine, it's not worth upgrading the machine IMHO. A good T42p can be had for $500-550 these days, even T43p if you're lucky. So, part out your machine once you've bought the new one and you'll save a surprising amount of money.

Just my $0.02

Wow - didnt know that thanks man. I dont know if I can stay in the thinkpad game for the specs I need as an engineering student and not having any cash