how long your laptop can survive?

hi everyone,
how long you think your laptop can survive?
i think my laptop will survive not more than 2 years....what about you ???

 

I used my first laptop for 3 years (Aug 2005 - Aug 2008) and then sold it for $600 cash. It was an ASUS Z70V.

I hope I will use my second laptop for around 3 years too (Aug 2008 - Aug 2011). This one is ASUS F8Va-C1 (in my sig).


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my dv7t - in my sig - should last a while. it is a desktop replacement so it sits on my desk 99.99999% of the time.

i got it in august of 08 so it's been about 17-18 months so far. it's still working perfectly and i have no doubt in my mind that it wont last at least 3 years.

i got the fastest CPU they had for sale at the time so i know that my pc will be able to handle most newer software that will come out. i upgraded from vista to windows 7 and my machine is working perfectly with it.

i dont plan on upgrading anything on it right now. if SSD prices drop considerably, i'll maybe get an ssd drive for it. otherwise, i think it's a perfect machine and should last a while longer.

 

I"ve got a compal CL51 from Sept 2004 that still runs like a charm, what a laptop it was back in the day, still does pretty good today.

I also have an Asus Z62F from Jan 2006 right when the first Core Duo's came out. It still runs like a charm.

 

I think how long your laptop lasts depends on not only how you treat it but how much you want to play with it when it breaks.

To keep my laptop looking "new" and performing as such, I've replaced or fixed:
-Keyboard - keycaps started wearing off
-Media keys - something hit them in a bag so put another set on
-Palmwrest - showed signs of age so replaced that
-Hinges - tightened and shimmed, they feel new

My laptop will last as long as there are parts on ebay.

Nothing replaced has actually "broke", bar a hard drive, but I just take time to make it look neat.

 

I look for 2 years for mine. After that is just a bonus.

 

2012, see sig below.

 

my sager's about 2.5 years old. the only thing i've replaced is the keyboard and hard drive (to a larger capacity).

 

I bought my sony vaio sz3 in september 2006 and its still going strong. I replaced the ancient toshiba 5400 rpm hard drive with a speedy intel ssd and even for a 3 year old laptop it still runs strong. I have no intention of replacing it. I might need a new battery because the current one only lasts for about 2 hours. Nevertheless Sony OEM Batteries are kind of on the expensive side and I don't want to get the craptastic batteries from China ;-)

 

My IBM T42 is 6 years old, and still in excellent condition.

The Matsua (Panasonic) battery was manufactured in Japan and still delivers 5 hours of battery life with only 10% wear. All in all a splendid laptop, though the CPU is a tad slow for Windows 7. Still, I confidently hope this machine will continue running until 2012 or so.

 

No doubt in my mind that my Latitude D830 won't last a few more years. Although its needed a replacement hinge, a couple new keyboards, a new battery, and the Bluetooth module was DOA from the factory.

Oh yeah, HDD crashed too.

But then again.. Its been on >300 flights. I use it 10 hours a day, in the office, and on the couch. In other words...it gets abused. At least 6-8 power cycles a day. 2.5 years old, one of the earliest builds. eBay is awash with replacement parts for the D630/D830 series, so I doubt I'll have trouble keeping it for as long as I want.

 

At that rate of parts replacement, you probably already have a new laptop.

 

My sonys reaching like 5 years old or something daft (spilt a cup of juice over that thing too!) i've had to disconnect the keyboard and shortcut keys pcb though due to random taps but other then that all the stained juice components are fully functioning.

This laptop is having a bad year (after tripping on the ice and it hitting first :S) its still alive, have a malfunctioning vga port though, problem with it identifying EDID info from other monitors

So im trying best i can to leave it on a desk, im going to give this 2-3 years, more it its willing to go the distance .

 

Only time will tell!

Got my Asus Netbook last year, late June and it hasn't made me pull my hair out as yet.

** Smart Comment Alert **
But I guess when you've got one of the Best SSDs in your computer system it makes the life on the other components in the system easier.

So in essence the longevity of my Netbook depends on how long my SSD can go.

And, only time will tell!

 

I generally keep my laptops for about 3 years so that's the . After that, even if the machine still works, it can't play the games I like anymore. I'm also fairly brutal with them in terms of usage -- they're on about 15 hours a day 7 days a week and I carry them to work and back whenever I go there. My current one (a Compal JFL92) is nearing 2 years of age (I bought it at the end of February 2008) and while its days are possibly numbered because of the 8600M GT, I haven't had any problems with it yet.

 

Had a Thinkpad that I ran for 5+ years before I handed it off to a nephew.

 

Well, I'm fairly confident that mine will last for another three years at least, if not five.

And I still have an old IBM Aptiva (desktop) from 1999.

 

Well if I assume you're referring to functionally and not structurally, I'd think 3 years should be about right. However, considering the high abuse a laptop takes, the structure should begin to show wear at around a year or so later.

On the other hand, today's laptops are constructed of a lot more durable (and recyclable) material than just a few years ago. Given that, 5 years might not be out of the question. So, as long as you continue to upgrade, you might get away with it.

 

Other than the keyboard...there's really nothing I can 'blame' Dell for. Identical problems would have shown up on a Thinkpad. And the full metal frame of the Latitude D-series means that the motherboard doesn't run quite as hot as some of the plastic-enclosure alternatives.

 

A high rate of defective parts is not Dell's fault?

 

Well..the hinge simply wore out. The hard drive was a Hitachi, of which, Dell had no influence whatsoever on its design. I've taken my laptop on over 300 flights already, and it gets a dozen cycles a day of opening and closing, so its most thoroughly abused. There's no doubt in my mind that I would've chewed up and spat out many typical cheap-sh*t laptops (the kind you buy at the mall) by now if I was using them.

The key is to focus on the causes of the failures. Stuff like hard drives, the only thing a laptop manufacturer can do is make sure they run cool by providing an adequate thermal framework.

 

My ThinkPad T21 is now 10 years old still chugging away with it's 20GB Hitachi Travelstar

 

Cool
My Inspiron 8500 is going to turn 8yrs old soon. Great machine, still runs great. Upgraded it to the Max, and it is still a very responsive little beast.
Most laptops will last as long as you want them to, given that they are designed right, and you take care of it.

K-TRON

 

my Acer Aspire 3503wlci is 4.5years old it works but it's been in it's box for the last 2 years...

 

I disagree with this.

But I agree with this.

 

I think what he means is he uses it so much that he isn't surprised stuff wears out, not high rate of failure.

 

I got my gx-633 when MSI released it back in late August of 09, and have already had to send it in to replace a cooling fan that went out. It sits on my desk all the time so i hope to get 3-4 years out of it, but if stuff keeps breaking for no reason then i will get something else.

 

I had a Dell Latitude that I ran for 7 years before passing it on. I also had a functioning IBM 5140 that ran fine after 20 years (I was not the original owner) aside from a battery problem.

 

My 10 year old Dell Latitude LS is still going strong. The magnesium chassis/body is still in absolutely flawless structural condition (can lift it by all corners with 0 flex/creak). The cpu fan makes a lot of noise if it turns on, but the 400mhz PIII doesn't heat up much when running iTunes and surfing the net with a PCMCIA wireless card.
http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/may2000/nf00511c.htm

I had hoped my T61p would last a similar amount of time, but the G84M problem guarantees a premature death. Judging by what people are saying here, it sounds like most people only use a laptop for around 2-3 years before getting a new one. These days, it seems that there are highly diminished returns for a manufacturer to make a machine that lasts much longer than that.

 

Wrong! A computer is not just a physical device it's a technological one as well. When they can no longer keep up with modern programs and peripherals, they are OBSOLETE!

Also incorrect! If it's not Dells fault, who's fault is it? In fact, it is the manufacturer who is ultimately responsible for the computer as a whole. And the fact that many people don't realize that is alarming.

It's the old story of the car vs the tire manufacturer: Is it bad tires of a bad car? In fact, it's the car manufactures job--and ultimately his responsibility--to make sure the tires he chooses meet safety and capability specifications. That means doing everything within reason (i.e. testing) to make sure he's getting what is expected. And so to is it with Dell (or any other manufacturer).

For example, if Dell chooses cheap parts that continuously fail, just to save money, then they should be held responsible for producing a poor quality product. Yes, individual components can fail on occasion (and these situations can typically be handled on a case by case bases), but it's the manufacturer, that bears the ultimate burden and responsibility of fixing the product. When they don't, the consumer should be able to seek compensation.

That's just the cost of doing business and the chance a company takes when it goes into business. It's also why the "recall" is an important part of maintain a good reputation in the eyes of the consumer.

 

I have an HP DV4t so it all really depends on the motherboard. :/

I'm not sure whether it'll last until Fall of 2011 or not, I'm planning on giving it to my brother this Fall anyways and was hoping it would last him for his two years of community college before he goes off and transfers.

I don't really run graphic intensive programs I basically browse, use Word, and run Zune software. I think the Zune runs the most power and could kill the motherboard the most.

What do you guys think?

 

HP 8530w here, bought early December for next to nothing

P8700 @ 2.53
4gb DDR2800
320gb 7200rpm, soon to be 160gb X25-m SSD
15.4" 1680x1050

I couldn't quite hold on for i7 quads, as my last machine died in late November. Two months later and I would have been on the i7 bandwagon, at twice or three times the price.

Even with this, I don't see any need to upgrade in the next 18 months. My work is pretty demanding so I usually change out every year or so to stay near the cutting edge (okay, 6 months behind the cutting edge). This machine will probably last longer than normal because of the SSD and nice screen. It's also got a 3 year next-day-service warranty, so I don't have to worry about it bricking itself and sticking me with a big bill.

I may slap a X9100 or T9900 in here at some point if they get down into the $150-200 range. The extra cache (6mb vs 3mb) could make a big difference for some of my work. I expect that the SSD upgrade here in the next couple weeks will help me forget about the CPU for a while though.

 

My Sony is over 5 years old, and is still my primary computer. I see some Thinkpads even put this to shame, but then I remind myself that it only cost $1100. Divide that by 5 and that's $220 per year. Also note that I pack/unpack up my laptop 2x per day taking to and from work, using it anywhere from 4-12 hrs per day. I'm impressed with how well it has held up considering it is a consumer laptop.

 

i have a vaio pcg k215m on my desk with simialr specs to the one above and it still works like new and hasnt had a single new part although being used regularly although it is only used occasionaly now. my one has 512mb of ram and that combined with the fact that theigp uses some of it means it can get slow at times.

id like my current vaio to last for another year or so before i get an i5 replacement laptop but this all depend on whether my gpu will hold out but im still under warranty and my temps are getting higher with age. im currently planning on getting windows 7 and a hitachi 7k500 which should speed things up bit.

 

My dv6 is only 7 months old but I hope it'll last me at least 2 years, hopefully more like 3 or 4. I think it depends if and how my requirements change.

My Toshiba L100 is pver 3 years old now and has had a new faster hard disk and a cover over the lid but apart from that remains identical to when it was bought, 1GB RAM and all. It's now on Vista and acting as a media centre but long live the L100.

 

My Dv5t was bought in late december 2008 so its 13 months old... suprisingly , it's lasted quite long as i usually break a lot of things... I hope to keep it till sep or oct when i go to uni and then get a new laptop. I also have a Dell Latitude D600 which my mother used to use at work for years... still working after a motherboard replacement and broken hinge... it's reaching it's 6th birthday soon...

 

lol i go to uni too this and i hope my vaio will last athough i will probably build a desktop at some point this summer as i dont have the money for a gaming notebook. what university u looking at going to.

 

My ThinkPad T43 will be 5 this summer, and is still running pretty strong. I've got some USB problems I can't seem to resolve, and sometimes it refuses to boot unless I push the RAM panel in, but other than that, it's still a beast. It lasted 4.5 years of undergraduate torture, I'm impressed.

 

I have a 9-year-old Dell Inspiron 8200 in my basement, which will work perfectly fine, if I care to boot it up, that is... In any case, I don't see a reason why it will not be just as fine 10 years from now. Of course, I may have to replace the hard drive, and the LCD is going to be a problem (backlights typically dim at a constant rate; ten years from now, this laptop would probably really, really need an external monitor).

Ridiculous to expect a laptop to last for only a couple of years.

The question of whether or not you actually want to use such an old laptop for anything is a different one, of course.

 

i live in the UK so its gonna be UK uni and i'm doing aerospace engineering so there's gonna be a lot of CAD which i doubt my notebook can handle well... looking for Clevo D900F replacement with core i9 and ATI 5870... should own any program i have to use..

 

I think my acer will last forever IF I replace the nvidia8600m gt with an ati hd4650 or any other non nvidia 8 series gpu.
Since I also use it as a dekstop replacement most of the time, its no wonder it's lasted me for 27 months so far.

 

Well I replaced the broken AC adapter on the dell and looking to get another 2+ years out of it!

I'm at 2 years with my 8600mGT in my dell and no issues here, even after OC'ing it for a while.

 

I have a Vaio S170 that's going on 5.5 yrs and works 100% perfectly. It still gets frequent use. Before that I had a Vaio Z505 that was purchased in 2000 and lasted a good 6+ yrs.

Oh, and I have a Mac Powerbook 520 circa 1994 that still works & incredibly still boots off of the original hard drive! (although it switches itself off every 15 mins, probably something to do with the internal battery).


Barring any physical accidents, I think the useful life of most laptops has more to do with your willingness to continue using an outdated CPU etc. rather than the ability of the machine itself to function.

 

Well I have issues, I get rainbow sparks, purple mountain/triangle lines, black screen freezes, and so on ;P
I'm just waiting for the ati hd 4650 to drop in price (it costs 195€ atm, which is a lot cheaper than buying a new laptop, but I rather spend 50-100€ .

Edit: I agree with mrT man, its the willingness to use something for a long time. For a gamer like me 2 years is definitly the maximum, but if you only need word or internet, then you could make ur laptop last for ages, and would probably opt for a repair instead of replacement in case of hardware errors.

 

i was just asking cos i live in the uk as well although im only planning on doing computer science at uni so my notebook should do the job unless i decide to go in to games programming.

 

I know Im one of the lucky ones. Must be the 17in chassis.

 

On the other, hand it IS a computer! ...and by definition must keep up with technology. Your suggestion that an already nine year old computer will be "just fine" in another ten years, is scary.

 

I had a beautiful sturdy thinkpad T61 that I used for 2 years and was still looking like just a few weeks old (no exaggeration), without any problems, hardware- or software-wise. I bet it could last 5 more years if still in my own hands. I sold it, though, after warranty expired. Not sure how the new owner is treating it now I'm a super meticulous laptop keeper Be nice to your machine and it will be nice to you

 

Now you know better than that. How many times have you heard people complain about Dell faulty hinges? The last thing that should fail on a notebook should be the hinges. If something as basic as that doesn't work, that's a pretty crappy piece of equipment as far as I'm concerned.

 

What I had in mind was, I never eat cookies with my mouth above the keyboard, never place coffee anywhere near my laptop, never put laptop on the armrest of a sofa, always turn off the machine if not using it for prolonged time (not sure if this is important, though), ... Just reduce any risk of overheating, bumping, scratching, ... What is not up to me is any software problem, but I haven't met any serious ones.