My Latest Laptop

Published on 2020-05-30

First of all I bought this about a year ago.

I have 3 working laptops(and one not working).

Among them x200 is the latest acquisition. This is how I got it.

One day I was browsing the carousel(online platform to sell new/used goods in Singapore). There was a listing of a thinkpad x200 for 20 SGD. To give some background this model is released for 1k+USD on year 2008. Here on 2020 it's on sale for 20SGD. As I was already the proud owner of 2 thinkpads, I knew the great build quality of these models. Description said it was not turning on. But for 20SGD I thought it's worth a try.

So I contacted the seller. He offered to come to the Basement of SMU(Where I work). So we arranged a date for the sale.

On that date I went to the arranged meeting place. With a friend who was intrigued by this idea of 20S$ laptop. As promised the seller came on time. He was a nice young guy. Want to get rid of faulty laptop he got for most probably sub 20S$. Or may be it was a family heirloom.

I paid him 20S$ and got the laptop. He wanted to know what I'm planning to do with it. I was hoping to get it working after a thorough cleaning. But I didn't want to tell that and make him feel he got the wrong end of the bargain. So I told him a lie. I told him I already owned another non working laptop of the same model and hoping build working one combining parts from both. (That was actually my backup plan). So we parted ways feeling both got richer.

I came home and disassembled the laptop. It required only one philips screw drive to take it all apart. And to my utter dismay the mother board had a burn mark and seemed fried. Infact after reassembling it didn't work. That puts end to my 20S$ laptop dream.

Now as for the backup plan, I started looking for a x200 motherboard. No luck. But there was a another unit(working one this time) with a yellowing screen and Japanese keyboard layout for 90S$ on carousel. I only wanted a motherboard. But I was pretty sure this guy won't sell me only the Motherboard. If he do he'll end up in the same place as me. So I contacted him and offered to buy the laptop minus hard disk and RAM for 50S$. Both he can sell separately with ease. He agreed.

We met. I checked the device. Removed the ram+hard disk. Payed the guy. Brought the devise home.

On the following weekend I disassembled both devices. Cleaned all the parts. Put the Mother board from 2nd unit in the first one. And voila, I ended up with one working and one not working laptops for 70S$.

It's battery life was pretty bad. Best battery from both devices only holds for ~30min. So I plugged my external hard disk in to it and configured it as a wireless home media server. To this date(It's about a year now since the operaion) it happily serves media to me. Not a bad place to end up for a 12 year laptop IMO.

That's the story of my latest laptop.

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