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    Total upgrade of TravelMate 2300

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by abitclueless, Jul 19, 2009.

  1. abitclueless

    abitclueless Newbie

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    Hi all,

    I'm a bit clueless (the name rather gives it away!) about upgrading, so I really am taking everything on trust!

    This are the specs of my laptop:
    Manufacturer : Acer Inc.
    Mainboard : Acer TravelMate 2300
    Chipset : Intel i852GM
    Processor : Intel Celeron M 330 @ 1400 MHz
    Frequency : 1400 MHz - (current : 1398.82 MHz)
    Support : Socket 479 mBGA
    Cache L1 : 64 KB
    Cache L2 : 512 KB

    Basically, I want to know what I can do to bring this machine back to life, and run as fast as possible. Would be perfect if it could be brought up to a level so that it would be capable of running Windows 7, but I understand that maybe overly optimistic.

    Just to add, two of the USB ports need repairing, and I'd like to have a DVD rewriter installed (only read DVD at present). Could wireless 802.11g be installed as well?

    I have a max budget of £150.

    I'm eagerly awaiting your response!
     
    abitclueless, Jul 19, 2009
    #1
  2. razorjack

    razorjack Notebook Consultant

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    Truthfully you would be better to save up and get a new laptop. it's to old to waste a dime on,its just not worth it.
     
    razorjack, Jul 20, 2009
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  3. abitclueless

    abitclueless Newbie

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    Well that's the funny thing. I am getting a new laptop, but I want to make the best use out of the old one.
     
    abitclueless, Jul 20, 2009
    #3
  4. Mastershroom

    Mastershroom wat

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    There's not really much you can do to it at this point; your processor is a Socket 479 BGA (ball grid array), which generally means the CPU is soldered to the motherboard. How much RAM do you have, and what type? That's usually a quick, cheap and easy upgrade. Also, perhaps a faster hard drive if you have 5,400 RPM now.
     
    Mastershroom, Jul 20, 2009
    #4
  5. abitclueless

    abitclueless Newbie

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    I hope this is what you need to know:

    * 512MB of DDR333 SDRAM (manual says it's upgradable to 2048MB with dual soDIMM modules!)

    * 512KB flash ROM BIOS
     
    abitclueless, Jul 20, 2009
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  6. Evolution

    Evolution Vox Sola

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    I had a travelmate 2301LCI a few years back, and I can tell you there isn't much there to upgrade. You can upgrade from your current 512mb of ram to 1gb but the 2300 uses DDR memory which is very expensive now compared to DDR2.

    The hard drive should be either a 20gb, 30gb or 40gb 4200rpm PATA drive. You can probably upgrade that to a higher capacity (160gb) and faster RPM (5400rpm) PATA drive but don't expect a huge performance gain from doing that. Other than that the Intel extreme graphics are not upgradeable.
     
    Evolution, Jul 20, 2009
    #6