Old Laptop running WindowsME

knuckledragger

Okay, stop laughing...

I was fishing about in the bottom of a cupboard the other day and found my old Time laptop. I dusted off the cobwebs and found there was still life in it! Unfortunately it's running WindowsME. It's a P3 700mhz with 128mb of RAM (stop it...) and my question is:
Can it be salvaged?

Can the RAM be upgraded? Can I put an OS on it that at least will be supported by AVG, Malwarebyte, etc?

I don't mind getting a screwdriver out and dismantling as necessary as it was only an antique paperweight until today...

Donnie

Maybe you can create a report with CPU-Z, produce a .txt dump(found on the 'About' tab and post the relevant parts here.

knuckledragger

Donnie,
sounds awesome- what did you say?:)
Only kidding, clicked on the link and it's very helpful. I'll get the steam going on the boiler tomorrow and try and post the result.

gonzo127

how about forget windows altogether and go for one of the lightweight ubuntu versions?

something like Lubuntu
Lubuntu is targeted at "normal" PC users running on low-spec hardware. Such users may not know how to use command line tools, and in most cases they just don't have enough resources for all the bells and whistles of the "full-featured" mainstream distributions.
A Pentium II or Celeron system with 128 Mb RAM is probably a bottom-line configuration that may yield slow yet usable system with Lubuntu. It should be possible to install and run Lubuntu with less memory, but the result will likely not be suitable for practical use. If you have less than 160 Mb RAM, you will need to use the Minimal installation instructions. Please note that especially on lower powered machines (older CPU's) or low RAM systems, that the installation may seem to 'hang' at about 95%, don't worry, it has not; it can just take some time (possibly over an hour).

or Xubuntu
You need 192 MB RAM to run the Live CD or 192 MB RAM to install. The Alternate Install CD only requires you to have 64 MB RAM at install time.
To install Xubuntu, you need 2.0 GB of free space on your hard disk.
Once installed, Xubuntu can run with starting from 192 (or even just 128) MB RAM, but it is strongly recommended to have at least 256 MB RAM.

if you go with one of the above it will run and there will be no need to have a anti virus program on it since its based on Linux so doesnt get virus's

amcluesent

I'd upgrade to running MS-DOS 6.2, that should be quite nippy.

prowla

Stick a bit more memory in it (256, or if you are lucky 512), and you've got a netbook!

knuckledragger

gonzo127,
your post has just given me several hours of research to do! I'll look into it.

amcluesent,
MS-DOS 6.2, how?

prowla,
don't tease- I have a net book already. If I can get the lappy running anywhere near serviceable, it'll be going to a worthy cause.

closed

avast4 supports me.

gonzo127

knuckledragger wrote: »

gonzo127,
your post has just given me several hours of research to do! I'll look into it.

haha well i do like to 'help'

anyways as has been said above some more RAM wouldnt go a miss no matter what way you go, however cost depends very much on what type of RAM you need

really old SD ram http://www.ebuyer.com/product/142449 £30 for 512mb
old DDR ram http://www.ebuyer.com/product/107387 £20 for 512mb or http://www.ebuyer.com/product/191935 £35 for 1gb

i personally doubt you would have DDR2 ram in such a old system hence not putting any up but if you run the CPUz program or visit http://www.crucial.com/uk/index.aspx?gclid=CKSh7fWK1KMCFWMA4wodEV3-HA&cpe=pd_google_uk&ef_id=1725:3:s_1bf30be9bbbca84aa85c47a92ba8ce24_6110467219:THTDrAqoEEQAACHQNowAAcJw:20100825071804 and scan your system it should hopefully tell you what type of RAM you need

culpepper

you could give puppy linux a go.
There is a free forum run by the developer, something like Murga.com I think but google will find it, which has all sorts of versions and quite a few people are using very old computers with success and posting their results and findings.

gonzo127

culpepper wrote: »

you could give puppy linux a go.
There is a free forum run by the developer, something like Murga.com I think but google will find it, which has all sorts of versions and quite a few people are using very old computers with success and posting their results and findings.

puppy is a good call as it is generally thought of as being a little quicker than Lubuntu (which in turn is a bit faster than xUbuntu) however i thought the Lubuntu option would be slightly better due to it being a better supported and a little less confusing (just look at the shear amount of Puppy versions out)

anyways something that might help the OP would be this site http://desktoplinuxreviews.com/