Inherited A20p

[ninjaronin18]

Dear all,

I inherited a Thinkpad A20p from a relatively low-level computer user who thought the laptop could not be fixed. Anyways, it looks very muched used from the outside with scratches, slightly damaged screen. Hardware-wise, everything is fine except for the battery doesn't hold a charge any more. Software-wise, even after clean installing xp pro 32-bit, the laptop runs very slow with automatic updates on. My main laptop is the t61p. Anybody have any pointers for the A20p? Thanks in advanced. Oh, I didn't realize how much I prefer the standard screen over the widescreen. Now, I know what people are talking about. I also think my A20p has flexview because the colors/brightness don't/doesn't get washed out viewing from the sides.

[hausman]

There's a wealth of info on the A20p here.

As for speed, my A21p is also very slow running XP SP3. Part of the problem is the max 512MB RAM limitation on the motherboard. It's also my impression that SP3 significantly slows down older PCs compared to SP2.

As for 4:3 vs. 16:9, I too am a staunch fan of the former. And yes Flexview on an 8 or 9 year old A2x beats the TN crap on even the most current notebooks.

[ajkula66]

Sorry guys, but that LCD as nice as it is, is NOT a FlexView...the first machines to have IPS screens were A3x series

As for A20p, max out the RAM at 512MB and run W2K on it and it's going to feel as fast as any modern machine in XP...

[hausman]

NOT a FlexView...the first machines to have IPS screens were A3x series

I stand corrected. Whatever panel technology is in the A21p it still looks better than a lot of newer notebook panels. As a side note, the A20p has a 1400x1050 panel while the A21p was the first with 1600x1200.

As for A20p, max out the RAM at 512MB and run W2K on it and it's going to feel as fast as any modern machine in XP.

That's true but there are a couple of caveats, especially if you intend to use the system for serious work:
1. Win2k is at the end of its support lifecycle (extended support ends next year) so you may not get the same level of security and integrity patches as with XP.
2. New versions of application software may not work under Win2k.

[ajkula66]

hausman wrote:

Whatever panel technology is in the A21p it still looks better than a lot of newer notebook panels

Agreed 1000%. Some of the panels on early A2x machines were supposedly made by IBM themselves (at least that's what the parts lookup makes you believe) and frankly, it shows...even if they were outsourced to a zillionth party, they still look pretty swell...

As for possible issues with W2K...you're absolutely right. However, "serious work" nowadays usually implies more than a P III Coppermine CPU and 512MB of RAM...

On another note, I have yet to find a Linux distro that works properly on these machines, or to my liking, I should say...but sometime soon (LOL) when I get some free time, I'll give that a go as well...

[hausman]

I have yet to find a Linux distro that works properly on these machines

I tried Ubunto 8.04 on the A21p a few months ago. The biggest challenge was the 1600x1200 resolution. IIRC Ubunto displayed a screen that was split into three sections. Even though I managed to find instructions on the web to install an ATI video driver, it was difficult to navigate the Ubuntu file system to get to it and then install it. Once I got through that the basic system functions seemed to work OK. I didn't play around with stuff like power management, hibernation, etc. My impression was that Ubunto was definitely faster than XP SP3. But in the end I went back to good old familiar XP.

[sjthinkpader]

I also agree that Win2K run much better than XP on A20p with 512MB of RAM. This 1400x1050 panel was made by DBU, the IBM/Toshiba JV. The P/N prefix was ITSX where as the IPS (Flexview) versions use IASX prefix.

[hausman]

I also agree that Win2K run much better than XP on A20p with 512MB of RAM.

The thing is that WinXP Pro ran quite fast on my A21p when it first came out and I upgraded from Win2k. Even after SP1 and SP2 it ran more than fast enough for me to use it as my primary system to surf, e-mail, run MS-Office, Lotus Notes, etc. It was only after SP3 came out that the system really started to slow down. If it's possible to revert to SP2 and also somehow prevent Windows Update from trying to upgrade to SP3 again then I believe WinXP will run acceptably fast and more securely than Win2k.

BTW, yes, I did all of the usual speed enhancement stuff like defragging the HD, stopping as much GUI animation and other effects as possible, running as few ThinkVantage and other Windows ancillary processes as possible. Even so with SP3 even a lean and mean browser like Chrome is still annoyingly slow. Anyone know if Microsoft did something in SP3 to intentionally "encourage" users of 512MB systems to replace them?

[sjthinkpader]

...
The thing is that WinXP Pro ran quite fast on my A21p when it first came out and I upgraded from Win2k. Even after SP1 and SP2 it ran more than fast enough for me to use it as my primary system to surf, e-mail, run MS-Office, Lotus Notes, etc. It was only after SP3 came out that the system really started to slow down. If it's possible to revert to SP2 and also somehow prevent Windows Update from trying to upgrade to SP3 again then I believe WinXP will run acceptably fast and more securely than Win2k.

BTW, yes, I did all of the usual speed enhancement stuff like defragging the HD, stopping as much GUI animation and other effects as possible, running as few ThinkVantage and other Windows ancillary processes as possible. Even so with SP3 even a lean and mean browser like Chrome is still annoyingly slow. Anyone know if Microsoft did something in SP3 to intentionally "encourage" users of 512MB systems to replace them?

Your recommendation is very confusing. On one hand you recommended XP for the latest security patches. On the other hand you recommend not to update to the latest XP service pack due to slow performance. What are you really recommending?

[hausman]

Your recommendation is very confusing. On one hand you recommended XP for the latest security patches. On the other hand you recommend not to update to the latest XP service pack due to slow performance. What are you really recommending?

It's confusing because your options are limited with such an old system. ISTM that something in SP3 really slows down older systems with limited RAM. If you install Win2k you will lose most of Microsoft's security patches. If you revert to WinXP SP2 you'll continue to get most security patches (at least the ones that don't depend on something that's part of SP3.)

Either way you're exposed. That's something you'll have to live with on a system as old as a A2x.

My recommendation is that if you can find a way to permanently suppress SP3, then use WinXP SP2. If not, use Win2k. With Win2k you will have to go to Microsoft's website periodically to look for new updates because there is no automatic Windows update as there is with WinXP. Also in both cases install a good firewall like ZoneAlarm and anti-virus/anti-malware software like AVG.

[wild_bill]

Not sure what all the fuss is about here, I recently acquired an A21p UXGA 1600x1200 machine very cheap that has an 850Mhz processor and came with Win98 SE

I upgraded to XP Pro SP3, installed all Windows updates, installed a 7200 rpm hard drive, installed an extra 256MB to bring it to 512MB and did all my usual registry optimizations (I optimize laptops for a living)

well anyways, the bottom line is, I use Firefox and the machine browses lightning fast (almost as fast as my rocketship T60p) so the A21p definitely has potential, so keep reading on the web about optimization and keep pluggin away, you will get it!

PS - I am not even doing things like limiting the display theme quality, the XP is even pretty on this A21p!