Reviving an old TP 600X 2645-5EU with XP OS

I am planning to buy a new notebook shortly but once I get it, I owuld like to revive the laptop I am working on now which is a TP 600X 2645-5eu

It runs Win98SE and has a partitioned 12 gig harddrive: 2 gig C drive and 10 gig D drive.

Originally the IBM tech people said I could not upgrade to MS 2K because of driver problems and that there was no way to get rid of the partition b/c of the proprietary software.

Once I get my new laptop, which will hopefully be in a few weeks, I want to see if I can wipe the hard disk of my old TP and put on XP.

I keep my laptop on all through the night by my bed to use for music and an alarm etc. And I will probably use this old TP for that

I went to an IBM link provided by Makken on another thread of mine to see what I could do. I put in my model 600X 2645-5eu and from what I can see, I think I can upgrade to XP on this machine. But I am not sure. I don't know how to interpret what the site says.
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?sitestyle=ibm&lndocid=MIGR-4ZFRG3

and this link:

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/s...typeModel=2645-5EU&operatingSystem=Windows 98

The problem I was told by the IBM techs was that when they designed this computer's software, they partitioned the 12 gig hard drive into a 2 gig FAT 16 C drive and a 10 gig FAT 32 drive. All the tech suppor over there at IBM said there was nothing I could do about that--even though they acknowledged it was a stupid decision on IBM's part to do that. (Apparantly it was a hangover design form Win 95 which could not handle a FAT 32 C drive? or something like that?)

You can imagine the trouble I ran into with such a small C drive FAT 16.

I discovered by accident that IBM had software on there to convert the FAT 16 to FAT 32. But when I pointed it out to the techs, they told me not to risk it. But I did anyway and it worked fine and solved my space problem on the C drive for the last couple of years. (Most programs insist on loading something on the C drive where the OS even if you load the program itself on the D drive.)

So when I get my new computer, I would like to reformat this old TP to put on XP. Can anyone tell from the links I provided whether the drivers for my TP will work with XP. I have never done anythign like this, so I am not even sure what to look for to check out.

 

I've seen it and probably should help you given the drivers they have supplied for all of NT 5x, but be sure these are what you what because they don't always work! :buyIBM:

 

I think Win 2k is a better choice as XP is going to be very slow.

 

DO you think I should upgrade to WIn 2K? Over the Win 98SE? ANd given that IBM's restore disk partions the hard drive into a 2 Gig CD FAT 16 (which I am ablt to convert to Fat 32) and a 10 Gig Fat 32 D drive, is there a way that I can get rid of the partition and make it a no partiton 12 gig hard drive and when do I do this? Before trying to load WIn 2K?

 

When you install Win2k, it will allow you to reformat your entire drive and set up the partition table as you choose. A reformat install is the best choice anyways (to ensure maximum performance and stability), just be sure to back up anything you want to save to a CD or Flash Drive first.

And yes, you can do a full reformat install using the "Upgrade" version of the Win2k CD.

 

But why would you want to waste money buying an operating system after getting a new laptop? I mean, isn't the old ThinkPad semi-retired, anyway?