About the old Acer 6930G

Hi all
This is my first thread about laptops. I´d like to ask a few questions about this pretty old laptop that I got for free from a guy. It has some scratches and cons like the LCD backlight is gone (I´m thinking of buying a new CCFL to replace it), 2 or maybe 3 USB ports are not working...

The thing is I´m planning to upgrade the CPU at the cheapest price (now it´s a T5800, 4GB RAM) I could find. I was thinking of getting a T9400 as the T9600 is far more expensive, but then I found out the T9550 SLGE4 (E0) ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_Core_2_microprocessors#Dual-Core_Notebook_processors), some guy on this forum said it´d would fit without troubles on my laptop... so can anyone confirm this, please? I also read something about the E8335 and so on... would that fit and would be worth a try? I ´ve done a quick search and the prices are quite more expensive anyway. On the other hand, I guess I can completely forgot about something like Q9100, right?

The other point apart from the said above is the graphics card: it comes with a crappy 9300gs with 256MB DDR2. My wish was that it could run at least on low settings L4D2, but I got really poor FPS rates on Win Vista 64 (and I know the CPU has its fault on this too as it is 100% at the lowest res.). However I tried with Win 7 Pro 64 and I saw some improvement, maybe about 10 FPS more or higher (probably due to that the Win Vista install was a crap full of programs and maybe malware too). So is there any real deal I could get on Ebay to improve the graphics? I saw someone talking about something like a GT130M (if i´m not wrong) what else could I try to searchc for?.
One last thing, does anyone know what thickness is used for the thermal pads on the RAM chips on those cards? any recommendations? Sorry If I asked something it was already aswered (at least my main question was not).
I hope anyone could give me a hand.

Thanks in advance and sorry for such a questionnaire.

Crush

 

Nobody?

 

No one answer cause the cost would be cost prohibited to the point the money spent would better benefit getting a new computer that could far out exceed the OLD Acer. And since you got it for free your going to spend money fixing it? That doesn't comprehend no matter how you want to spin it.

 

Hi SJ, and thx for giving me at least one answer... the thing is I have no other laptop on my own and a CPU like the T9400 or the T9550 can be bought for just €/$15 on ebay. That would make it slightly faster and might get me some FPS on L4D2 and maybe other old games for just a little money... that´s the point. The other things are "optional" as far as I could get them really cheap.
I own a powerful desktop PC, the fact is that I need to stay away from home due to work for about 11 days per month and I would be using this laptop daily (now using an external monitor) just a few hours at night before bed time, that´s the whole story.

 

A middle of the road, performance-wise, circa 2009 notebook with tech/performance inside that is closer to a 2007/8 model?

Yeah; free this is not.

Anything other than a learning experience with this will be money (not so) well wasted.

While the parts to upgrade may seem cheap right now, the issue is with the rest of the mostly non-upgradeable parts (M/B being the biggest one). With 2 or 3 USB ports not working on it already, this is just the beginning of the end for this platform.

I would not spend a dime on this myself.

 

crush360, GT240M MXM II is your card. Thermal pads on video memory are useless in this scenario, and will cause GPU cooling problems if they're too thick. E8335 will do if you don't care about battery life; if you do care, get P9600/P9700/T9900 and DIY/professionally rebuilt battery using top cells. But hey, it would be much better if you just follow good advice by tilleroftheearth and get a newer machine, Haswell or later, instead of investing in this obsoleteness.

 

Furthest you can go on the GPU is a GT 330m or a 4670/4650. Those are the fastest MXM II cards. 330m is better because it runs much cooler and you can overclock it to beat the 4670. Problem is you'll need a ROM chip soldered on if you want to use it, or you'll have to integrate the VBIOS of the card into the SBIOS. Valuxin can help. Also it's somewhat hard to find. There's some Toshiba ones on aliexpress right now for pretty cheap. The ATI's will run much hotter, so expect temps in the 80 range. Those will work

If you cannot get any of those, go for a 240m. It's about 10% slower than a 330m, but will work well.

CPU, X9100, E8335 (SLGEB) or T9900. If you're going to get an X9100, make sure you've got some decent thermal paste. Quads will not work. The chipset does not support them unfortunately.

 

Just as @ tilleroftheearth mentioned, it may look cheap first but to really get out something of this rig, you have not only to upgrade CPU/GPU but max out RAM and HDD -> SSD also.

So it's like this:

CPU: T9900/X9100 - 50>€
GPU: HD 4650/70 - 70-100€
RAM: 2x4GB 1066Mhz - 30€
SSD: 128GB - 50€

So you have to spent at least roundabout 200€/230$ to get your rig somewhat 'performant'. Considering that you eventually have to replace your Screen as well -> another 30€ at least, you end up by spending 230€/260$. It's a bit.... meh! Isn't it?

AND the amount of working time not considered in this calculation....

By the way: I exactly did this with my ol' bro's Laptop (Toshiba P300). And after get rid of all the Problems (mostly overheating issues - pain in the a**), it turned out that it was capable playing Crysis 2 in high Settings just fine!

Personally I love tinkering with Oldtimers and get them a 'refreshment', but surely it outweighs the costs in terms of use(fulness).... Just my 2Cents!

 

WTH, for some damn unknown reason I got no e-mail notifications so I didn´t know I got more answers .
Thank you very much guys. I actually bought in november on ebay a T9550 ( http://www.ebay.com/itm/261811253863?_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT) but I haven´t received it yet (I hope it works). I chose that one cause the price/performance ratio was the best one (- $14).
Regarding the RAM, I thought the max. amount for this one was only 4GB. Can anyone confirm this please?
On the other hand, I´m not gonna get a new screen or repair the USB ports... I just bought a D-link 7 ports switch which will solve that. The screen is not a problem as I got a 22" LG 1080p tv/monitor at my work place.
About the graphics, as I think the money needed is not gonna be worth the effort, I´m seriously thinking of getting a second hand professional laptop on ebay. Damn it, I missed a really great deal (elitebook 8760w) in the last days of December . I actually will start a new thread asking about which pro laptops I should try to search for.

I really appreciate your help. Thanks again.