Upgrading an antique possible?

We have had an old 486DX-233 Intel Sager laptop sitting around for a couple of years and it occured to me that If I could upgrade this machine I might get a couple more years of service from it. Is this something that is possible at a modest cost, or have I simply lost my mind?

I am not looking to turn it into a core duo or anything like that. Just getting it back to use for basic schoolwork and light photo duties.

 

What are its current full specs?

 

Memory may be the only thing worthwhile...though a quicker hard drive might too. Everything else would cost too much.

 

I don't think you'll find any memory or a hard drive that that machine will use for a reasonable price. It'd almost cost less to just get the cheapest laptop you can find, and the new laptop would run 5x as fast. There are tons of back to school sales now, I've seen them go for near $500 or even less for just basic, basic machines.

 

If you get flyers mailed to your home from Circuit city, Costco, best buy, etc..You'll find some very affordable yet effecient computers on sale. They might not be jawdropping, or up to date on the latest gaming technology, but I think it'll be a better alternative to upgrading an old laptop.
Perhaps a desktop, but laptop upgrades are a bit pricier.

 

Hello,

If you dont have any problems with it, I dont see why not worth keeping it for couple more years. I have had my Dell L500cx (500 mhz and never been upgrade any parts) desktop computer for way more then 8 yrs, still running smooth. I bet that is your case on your notebook. What model is your Sager notebook? It is good to give another chance in life.

JC

 

No upgrade is going to get that laptop running Windows XP, and photo editing on it would be a very bad idea (486s are nowhere near fast enough to do that well).

For light school-work/office tasks it should be okay. If it's got a decent amount of RAM (32MB or 64MB would be good for a laptop that old) with Windows 98SE and Office 97 installed, it'd be adequate.

 

LINUX!

*hurries back to his hole*

 

Linux isn't a bad idea. The only problem I can see is that old laptops tended to use all sorts of wierd components - and even finding Windows drivers for them could be hard. Finding Linux drivers would be much harder.

 

486 DX2 33mhz... (its not 233mhz by the way, its DX2 and only 33Mhz. The 486 DX4 went upto 100/120Mhz). I would keep it for another 5 years and then see if you can sell it as a real antique. IN those days RAM use to cost about $50 per MB. lol

I remember one of those with windows 3.1 and windows 3.11 for workgroups. I doubt there is much you can do with it to prolong its life. Its not worth upgrading IMO because older components are hard to come by which means it can be pretty costly to upgrade anything. And no you can't upgrade it to a core duo or anything recent.

The problem is unless you have very ancient software you won't be able to do much with it. Even Linux may struggle with those specs...

Thounsands of Mhz vs Tens of Mhz (older tech). The difference is MASSIVE. Even the orginal pentium (pentium 1) is much faster.

 

For my idea, don't spend some money to upgrade an old generation machine, the old parts for upgrading will be more expensive to compare with the new parts such as memory. The new low-end model of laptop is very cheap, at least they have 256MB memory and 40GB hard drive, the cpu speed is enough to run Windows XP and comes with a wireless adapter. If you insist to use your antique gear, just use the old operating system and old version of application. They should be good enough to handle the regular documentation.

 

God thoughts folks. Thanks a bunch. I think I will get a bit of cosmoline out and grease it for storage. Later we can retrieve it from storage and confound the grand kids with it. By then computers will probably be implanted with neural transmitters for our ocular sensors and such. Count me out. Getting a virus or trojan would be a real .....