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I'm planning on buying a used laptop from E-bay and saw two that interest me. I'm not looking for high end or even one that is considered standard. Just one that let's me type my stories, some surfing and basic gaming.

These two peak my interest.

Dell Latitude D810 (Intel Pentium Mobile: 1.86GHZ, 1GB RAM, 40GB HDD, dedicated graphics card: 128MB X600) OS: WIN XP

Lenovo Thinkpad R61e (Celeron 1.86GHz 540, 1536MB (1 x 1GB RAM and 1 x 512MB RAM), 60GB HDD, Intel GMA X3100 Dynamic Video Memory Technology 4.0)
OS: Ubuntu 11.10

Which one is best? I'd like to purchase one tonight so I can get it as early as next week.

Thanks.

Basic gaming on either of those? Nope, unless you mean VERY basic. I'd peg any post 2003 game as out of either laptops power rating were low end when they were new. These were 1000$ laptops back then, today I'd not pay more than 300$ for either of them because both are before the massive jump in power savings we got around 2008.

Between the two of these I'd chose the Dell however as at least you can go somewhere with it unlike the Lenovo which will have everything sodered into place.

Mr Bean wrote:Basic gaming on either of those? Nope, unless you mean VERY basic. I'd peg any post 2003 game as out of either laptops power rating were low end when they were new. These were 1000$ laptops back then, today I'd not pay more than 300$ for either of them because both are before the massive jump in power savings we got around 2008.

Between the two of these I'd chose the Dell however as at least you can go somewhere with it unlike the Lenovo which will have everything sodered into place.

Well the laptop won't be a gaming rig that's for sure and I've got plenty of old games I'd like to play again so no biggie. Besides, the laptop won't leave the house unless necessary and it'll mainly be used for web and story/fanfic/novel writing.

Both the Lenovo and the Dell are both priced around $85 - $90, so not necessarily expensive.

But I've made my purchase. Unfortunately I did it minutes before I read your post. I went with the Lenovo. The pics show some minor wear but no cracks and the screen was in excellent shape. Once I get the laptop, I'll see if it is worth my time with Ubuntu or just pave and install XP or 7.

Enigma wrote:
But I've made my purchase. Unfortunately I did it minutes before I read your post. I went with the Lenovo. The pics show some minor wear but no cracks and the screen was in excellent shape. Once I get the laptop, I'll see if it is worth my time with Ubuntu or just pave and install XP or 7.

I'd keep the Linux if for no other reason then cost of the ram to run XP or Windows 7 well would be three times the cost of the laptop itself. No kidding, there are horders of old DDR1 and early DDR2 ram and 512 meg sticks cost more than 8 gig sticks and some things like Laptop ram can add a 50$ price premium because fuck if you have any choice on stuff over six years old.

To note however, 85$ is not a bad price for a laptop this old. I set my price point at 300$ being generous so buying it for less than a 1/3rd of that... The price is right at least.

Mr Bean wrote:I'd keep the Linux if for no other reason then cost of the ram to run XP or Windows 7 well would be three times the cost of the laptop itself.

I agree that 7's probably not an option, but XP isn't too bad on less than 2GB. Hell, I used to run it on a jury-rigged combo of 512MB and a 1GB page file on a second hard drive, and that worked better than you might think.

Come to think of it, though, just how retro are the games you're planning on playing on it? DOSBox and SCUMMVM have both been ported quite successfully, but WINE is a bit more hit-and-miss.

Zaune wrote:

Mr Bean wrote:I'd keep the Linux if for no other reason then cost of the ram to run XP or Windows 7 well would be three times the cost of the laptop itself.

I agree that 7's probably not an option, but XP isn't too bad on less than 2GB. Hell, I used to run it on a jury-rigged combo of 512MB and a 1GB page file on a second hard drive, and that worked better than you might think.

Come to think of it, though, just how retro are the games you're planning on playing on it? DOSBox and SCUMMVM have both been ported quite successfully, but WINE is a bit more hit-and-miss.

Haven't thought much about which games since it isn't going to be a gaming rig. If I do play games, it'll be Conquest of the New World (have the CD and bought a copy from GOG), Europa Universalis 1 (maybe EUII).

But that isn't going to happen for a while. I'm going to stick with Ubuntu until I can get 4GB of RAM (max the laptop can take) and a harddrive that is more than 60GB. Then I'll switch over to either XP or 7 (if the specs hold up).

I'd say get the Thinkpad. If you're going to be buying such ancient tech you might as well go for the one with more durable construction and doesn't feel nasty as fuck to type on.