You're going to laugh, but... (Toshiba 2800)

I've got an ancient (at least 5 years old) Toshiba 2800 laptop that I almost never used, as I'm mostly a desktop man. I recently got a new job where I will need a laptop with me in travels for web access, and was wondering if there was something stable I could do with my barely-used-but-prehistoric 2800 for the time being until I buy a new machine? The specs are horrible - 5 gig hard drive, microscopic RAM (64 mb!), 600 MHz Celeron, Windows ME as an OS and a PC card slot that can take two 5mm type 2 or one 10.5mm type 3. So, it won't be winning any races, but my question is, would there be a PC card wireless adapter (that's up to date as far as security and wi-fi standards go) that I can buy for this old clunker of a machine to take advantage of the wireless web that my hotel offers when i travel next week? Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Also, should I be worrying about battery safety with a machine this old?

 

one thing, get rid of Windows ME. It was the worse OS Microsoft made, Windows 98SE was much better then ME

 

Does it have any USB ports on it at all? That would open up a lot of wireless choices for you .. Also, might look into running Linux on something like that instead of Win98SE .. it might be a little bit nicer on your 64mb of ram.

 

Actually, yes, it has two! These would be slow USB 1's though. Still a better option than PC card adapters? As for installing Linux, I'm totally unfamilliar with that OS. I can install XP, which i have on my desktop, but since it's not optimized for mobile use (let alone for the tech of this older laptop) I'm weary of going there.

I'll soon be buying a Macbook, but am waiting for Merom to be available in them first. So, this is really just a temporary fix to hold me over and buy some time. Which USB wi-fi adapters would you recommend for such an old beast?

 

XP are you nutts???

You will need at least a 10gb HDD and 256mb Ram to run.

You could try Windows 2000, but I'd still suggest you upgrade your ram to 256mb at least, and try to find a bigger hdd... You wont be spending that much, but the upgrade will make your laptop "Usable" heheh//

 

I've installed winxp pro (for desktop) on a very old Dell laptop with a 400mhz cpu, 5+gb hdd, and I think 256mb ram. It worked fine, I think it took up at least 3-4 gb of hdd space. I didn't play any games on it, or any other media intensive application except for cd audio, mp3, and small videos. It did other things quite well like surfing the web as long as the site wasn't overloaded with junk (don't expect to go page hopping on myspace). For business applications, it did well, also. I mean, how intensive can excel and word get?

So, to answer your question, max out your memory, which is probably going to be like 256 or 512mb 133 sodimms, and install xp (yeah, I'm nuts haha). This should hold you over until you get a more powerful laptop. But, like I said, you're not going to be able to do much more than business applications, and light media, so just hit the bars and clubs when you're out of town on business. That's what I used to do.