Running XP on a old laptop, possible?

[pelsamra]

I recenlty acquired a Toshiba Satellite 1605 CDS laptop. It s has a AMD K6 (I think around 466MHZ) and 64 MB of RAM. Its currenlty running windows 98. I wanted to know if I could run XP SP2 on this laptop. It will only be used to type notes and papers and to surf the internet.

Thanks

[Scottie]

I think it would work if you had more ram 256 would be good I Installed it on a 750 Athlon desktop 3 weeks ago that had 180 MB but I didn't like the fact there was only 30 MB free after Windows so I added another 256 MB

[stiltman]

You meet the minimum requirements to run it, but it will be REAL sloooooooow

[bazooka]

You meet the minimum requirements to run it, but it will be REAL sloooooooow

I agree with the stiltmaster.

It will work but slow.

If you disable the candy graphics and some services. it may work better.

[pelsamra]

The laptop is only upgradable to 160 mb of ram. I'm guessing its out of the question the to install it with only 64mb of ram?

[waheed]

stiltman wrote:
You meet the minimum requirements to run it, but it will be REAL sloooooooow


I agree with the stiltmaster.

It will work but slow.

If you disable the candy graphics and some services. it may work better.

I used to have a P3 650Mhz, 128 MB Ram, 128 MB DDR Graphics Card (Nvidia G4 MX440) and it was really really sloooooow on that machine, in fact tooo slooow, so i went back to windows 98 until i upgraded my pc.

pelsamra, you JUST ABOUT meet the MINIMUM specs for running Windows XP. however, as my old pc specs are higher than the specs of your laptops, you can imagine how slow it will be.

Windows XP uses alot of power and memory, therefore the all of your memory and processor is used up by Win XP, leaving little or no room for running other applications.

My opinion, its not worth installing Win XP on the old machine, stick with Win 98 until you upgrade.

[808smokey]

I have a IBM aptiva 450mhz with only 64mb of ram and it runs XP Pro just fine. It boots and is ready to use in under 30 seconds. I did turn off all the "fancy" graphics, I run it in "Windows Classic" and increased the page file on the hard drive too. Turn off all the other automatic stuff too. Like Windows update, restore etc.

[redwudz]

Try Windows 2000 Pro. Runs good with limited memory and processor speed. Does most everthing XP does, just without the extras. It would be a big improvement over W98.

Edit: Also, how big is the harddrive? XP uses a lot of space. W2000 uses a lot less.

[Craig Tucker]

I am running XP sp1 on a PII 266, with 80MB of ram. Runs ok on that, obviously a bit on the slow side.

[Roundabout]

I agree with 808Smokey.

I'm running XPproSP1a on my old IBM laptop, has 500MHZ Smeleron and 192MB of RAM, and it does just fine. I haven't noticed any difference from when I upgraded it from Win98SE, if anything it runs faster. I don't do any encoding, etc. and I suppose that if I did, it would slow down a lot. Using it only for web surfing and e-mail and it's fine. I could speed it up a little more by turning off the graphics and such, but it seems fast enough the way it is.

So I'd say you'd be fine, as long as you turn off the graphics in XP, since you have a lot less RAM than I do.

[rallynavvie]

Sounds like mine, you using a ThinkPad 600X Roundabout? I'm running XP Pro SP1 on that and it works OK. Not very fast, but with a 4600rpm hard drive I'm not expecting anything close to my dekstop systems.

[Cobra]

If you are only going to use it for typing notes and surfing the Internet, why not use Linux? Mandrake 10 would be perfect for you - it is newbie-friendly. It is free, too.

Here is the link to a download site:

http://www.linuxiso.org/distro.php?distro=29

I have had it running on a few old machines and it zips along very nicely. You get a load of software with that, and it is a mainly automatic configuration - very easy.

If you don't like it, what have you lost? Twenty minutes?

Cobra

[bazooka]

stiltman wrote:
You meet the minimum requirements to run it, but it will be REAL sloooooooow


I agree with the stiltmaster.

It will work but slow.

If you disable the candy graphics and some services. it may work better.

I used to have a P3 650Mhz, 128 MB Ram, 128 MB DDR Graphics Card (Nvidia G4 MX440) and it was really really sloooooow on that machine, in fact tooo slooow, so i went back to windows 98 until i upgraded my pc.

pelsamra, you JUST ABOUT meet the MINIMUM specs for running Windows XP. however, as my old pc specs are higher than the specs of your laptops, you can imagine how slow it will be.

Windows XP uses alot of power and memory, therefore the all of your memory and processor is used up by Win XP, leaving little or no room for running other applications.

My opinion, its not worth installing Win XP on the old machine, stick with Win 98 until you upgrade.

I installed XP on a pentium 2 with 64MB and once I shut off some services and the candy graphics, it ran fine.

[docrobb]

With something Like that dig out an old copy of WFW 3.11 you'll be amazed at how that OS can fly!

[Roundabout]

Sounds like mine, you using a ThinkPad 600X Roundabout? I'm running XP Pro SP1 on that and it works OK. Not very fast, but with a 4600rpm hard drive I'm not expecting anything close to my dekstop systems.

rallynavvie,

No, actually it's a Thinkpad 1300 I-Series from early 2001 (about $1000 new). It came with the 500Mhz/64MB standard (I added 128MB soon after I bought it), with a 6GB HDD, 12"TFT and CD-ROM (no burner, of course).

I have to say, though, that I'm impressed with the quality of this laptop, I've taken it all over the world with me and logged on even in Russia and Ukraine, and it's worked like a champ. It's well built and the keyboard is solid, unlike some other brands I've tried. I'd recommend the IBM's to anyone looking for a good, long lasting laptop. Nothing has gone wrong with it since I bought it, except the 20GB HDD I put in the place of the original 6GB died after a couple of years, so I'm back to using the original 6GB for now, until I get around to replacing it someday - not a high priority.

I may buy another IBM eventually to replace this one. I think they're worth the extra $$ for something that'll last. What do you think of yours?

[rallynavvie]

The 600X is a 500 MHz P3 I think, it also has the same 192MB of RAM (same upgrade I'm sure). I bought it from a friend who sold it to me with a docking station, I added a wireless card, FireWire card, DC adapter for cars/planes, an additional bay battery, and a spare internal battery. It came stock with a 12GB hard drive but I'm looking at upgrading that. Did you just buy any old 2.5" laptop drive and swap it out? I'm looking at getting a 40GB Seagate 5400rpm drive. They have 7200rpm drives but I'd rather have battery life over drive speed. I'd also like to get a DVD drive for it so I can watch movies with it on flights.

I like the laptop though I wish it had a trackpad. I got really used to those after the one I had in school. Onboard 10/100 would be nice too since it just seems silly to have to pull out a card and a dongle for wired networking. I do get about 6-7 hours of battery time with the two batteries so that's fantastic. I needed it primarily to tune my car's engine computer but it was such a versatile unit that I used it for a lot more now. Pretty soon it will be acting as a giant remote control for my HTPC

[pelsamra]

Thanks for all your help. I tried installing Xp on it, way too slow. Instead I just installed windows 98, much better.

Thanks

[vitualis]

I have Windows XP running on a Pentium Classic 200 MHz MMX with 128 MB RAM as a file and internet server. Turn off all the eye candy and it loads reasonable quickly and is stable.

I have another computer which is a PIII 500 MHz with 384 MB or RAM and an Nvidia TNT 2 Ultra. This computer is actually my parent's main PC and they use it for internet, word processing, etc. With all the eye candy turned off (i.e., Win2k-ish), it runs pretty well.

Regards.

[Roundabout]

The 600X is a 500 MHz P3 I think, it also has the same 192MB of RAM (same upgrade I'm sure). I bought it from a friend who sold it to me with a docking station, I added a wireless card, FireWire card, DC adapter for cars/planes, an additional bay battery, and a spare internal battery. It came stock with a 12GB hard drive but I'm looking at upgrading that. Did you just buy any old 2.5" laptop drive and swap it out? I'm looking at getting a 40GB Seagate 5400rpm drive. They have 7200rpm drives but I'd rather have battery life over drive speed. I'd also like to get a DVD drive for it so I can watch movies with it on flights.

I like the laptop though I wish it had a trackpad. I got really used to those after the one I had in school. Onboard 10/100 would be nice too since it just seems silly to have to pull out a card and a dongle for wired networking. I do get about 6-7 hours of battery time with the two batteries so that's fantastic. I needed it primarily to tune my car's engine computer but it was such a versatile unit that I used it for a lot more now. Pretty soon it will be acting as a giant remote control for my HTPC

It took me a while to get used to the trackpoint, but now I prefer it over the touchpad approach. However, the only time I use the trackpoint is when I take the laptop somewhere, most of the time it stays at home and I use it as my main computer. In fact, I'm typing on it right now.

This one has built in 10/100 LAN, but not wireless. Wonder why yours didn't come with built in 10/100? I wish it had wireless networking, but even more, I wish it had a cd burner in it. Know of anywhere you can get a burner and install it in the place of the original cdrom? Seems like it should be possible, since the form factor of most of their laptops seems to be about the same.

I bought the 20GB HDD right after I bought the laptop, but it didn't even last two years before it died. It was an IBM drive, I bought and just stuck it in and formatted, worked fine for a while. Cost $175 for that 20GB - I could have sent it back because it was still in warranty, but I would have lost the chance to recover the data. There were pictures on there that I can't replace, and that is more valuable to me than a new drive. So I have it in a drawer and will take and have it recovered sometime, when I'm overseas and it's cheaper. Meanwhile, I reinstalled the original 6GB and it's working fine in it.

I bought the 128MB of RAM right away too, for about $100 at the time. That's all this unit will hold, there's no other upgrades possible. There's no docking station with this laptop, everything is inside - but not too heavy. Maybe around 6lb. or so. I like it a lot and don't plan on getting rid of it, since it works fine for what I do with it. I might buy another drive for it, and since I don't use it much on battery, I'll probably be looking at a 7200 RPM drive. Like I said, it's at home on AC most of the time, so the added speed would be nice to have. The drive that's in it is only 4200 RPM. Slow.

Overall, worth the money. Someday I'll buy another and sell this one, or give it to a relative. Seems to keep going day in and day out. Reliable unit.

[rallynavvie]

*continuing with the hijacking of this thread*

Your optical drive isn't removable? Mine is hot-swappable (except with the bay-battery in). I know there are DVD-ROMs for my drive bay, and I think there are CD-RWs too. If you only plan on using the burner at home I'd just get a DVD writer in a FireWire enclosure and get a FireWire card for it. I actually don't see a use for a burner in the field since I can just access one of mine at home when it's docked. I can only imagine how hot and how much power a laptop burner requires.

[Roundabout]

*continuing with the hijacking of this thread*

Your optical drive isn't removable? Mine is hot-swappable (except with the bay-battery in). I know there are DVD-ROMs for my drive bay, and I think there are CD-RWs too. If you only plan on using the burner at home I'd just get a DVD writer in a FireWire enclosure and get a FireWire card for it. I actually don't see a use for a burner in the field since I can just access one of mine at home when it's docked. I can only imagine how hot and how much power a laptop burner requires.

*Thread hijacking completed*

The optical drive in this unit is not removable, it's in the main cabinet of the computer. There's no docking bay, everything is internal. I guess yours is different, since it has a dock bay, most things are external to keep the travel weight down.

Mine was designed as an all-in-one, so it has the cd-rom inside, and the network card inside. I have an external HP burner that I use (cd-rw) with it, but it's USB1, since that's what the PC is. I'd have to get a USB2 or F/W card like you mentioned if I wanted to burn faster. That's why I'd love to have a CD-RW built in to the unit. Since most laptops have a cd burner built in these days, it'd be nice if it were possible to get one and put it in this laptop. I'd just disassemble the laptop, install the cd-rw and put it back together, so it'd be permanent. But I guess IBM doesn't sell the internal parts like that, or if they do, it'd probably cost more than it's worth.

I really don't need a DVD burner for this laptop, just a cd-rw would be nice, so I could make cd's on the go. I think it's too slow to be able to burn DVD's.

Specs on this laptop here.