how to revive an old T40p

[fjs08]

My wife is retiring her T40p. She wants a new machine and this one is seemingly dying a very slow death. I'd love to "play" with it and revive it. It is very slow. We get error messages galore when we try to reboot. For the last 6 months, I never turn it off, unless we are traveling, and when I turn it on, the check disk comes on and runs the gamut of tests, etc. I think the HD is dying. Any way I can "test" this once she doesn't need it anymore. If it needs a new HD, where can one be purchased. Is it worth it??? New notebooks are so cheap, I don't want to put a lot of bucks into it.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks.

Frank

[fjs08]

btw, it's pretty much a stock machine. I just looked and it has 1 gig of ram. I thought it had 2. Would adding another add anything. I don't know if I can add that to this machine.
Thanks again in advance.
Frank

[sarbin]

if you post your "model-type", we'll be able to help you better.

[phubai]

What is the computer used for? That would make a big difference in determining what you should do. If it's primarily an internet appliance and/or word processing, spreadsheet tool, a new computer wouldn't make that much of a difference at all, and I'd recommend you format the hard drive and reinstall the operating system and see what a difference that makes. Are you sure you're not suffering from spyware issues by the way?
I used an old A30p until about a week ago and was able to do everything that I typically do as quickly as on my new core duo for the most part.

Another alternative for systems that are getting a little long in the tooth is linux of course. Much lighter weight than windows.

Hard drives are relatively inexpensive if indeed yours is going bad, but a good format will tell you a lot about the condition of the drive. Of course, backup what you need to a USB flash drive or something before you begin. Do you have the recovery CD's? You can also try restoring from your hard drive recovery partition which will put it back to the way it left the factory (but a format/reinstall would probably be better).

The T40p in my opinion is a very good machine and worth restoring assuming problems are limited to the hard drive (which I think they may be). I love my MacBook, run Windows XP, Linux and OSX all on it, but I'd sure like to have my A30p's keyboard!!

Just my opinion though, and good-luck!

[fjs08]

>>If it's primarily an internet appliance and/or word processing, spreadsheet tool,<<

That's basically it.

Once I get the Vista box set up and running, I'll have to see what's what. I do know that when I used to shut down the TP at nite, then restart it in the morning before my running session, when I'd come back to the machine, every morning I'd have some message about some "major" type error that occurred. It's been a while, but I do think it mentioned the HD.

Frank

[phubai]

...format, and reinstall the operating system. It could serve you well for a few years to come!

[agarza]

Yes, I also recommend formatting the drive, but first run Drive Fitness Tool, and completely erase your drive, including Master Boot Record, if there is damaged sectors the software would 'tick them' off so that space is no longer used as a storage, hence reducing just a little bit your disk space but guarantee no more errors.