Upgrade or Replace Old Laptop?

Aidan P

Honorable
Sep 20, 2013
7
0
10,510
Hi,

I have an old laptop laying around; it's 5/6 years old, has just 2GB of RAM, an AMD Sempron M100 and is very loud and gets very hot. So it's basically a throwaway system, and I've always wanted to play with Linux but I don't want to mess up my system so I thought about putting it on the old laptop.

It runs fine for light tasks, and I'm wondering: would it be worth spending just a little bit of money (£100-£150ish maybe max) to rejuvenate it, or would this be money wasted? I know that components ware over time and ultimately upgrades are a good idea, but my primary concern is how loud and hot the fan gets; will new components as well as new thermal paste solve this or is it unlikely?

Thanks!
 
Solution
I would not waste any money it. The AMD M100 is a weak single CPU when it was newly released. Even doing something as simple as surfing the net can be demanding because webpages get redesigned over time and generally incorporates new codes / features that makes them more CPU demanding.

Save up your money for a new laptop. Even a refurbished / used laptop with a 2nd generation "Sandy Bridge" Core i3 / i5 CPU from 2011 will easily outperform that old laptop.

jaslion

Honorable
Dec 17, 2012
529
1
11,210


All you can really upgrade in a laptop is ram and hdd cpu's and other things are never a certain thing. It's a very weak system even in it's days it was low end so just get a new one. Money is wasted on it.
 

nathanstrainrocks

Estimable
Jun 10, 2015
32
0
4,590


A light linux distro would work fine. It does not need an upgrade. Look at Cloudready, they have an OS that could turn it into a chromebook.
 
I would not waste any money it. The AMD M100 is a weak single CPU when it was newly released. Even doing something as simple as surfing the net can be demanding because webpages get redesigned over time and generally incorporates new codes / features that makes them more CPU demanding.

Save up your money for a new laptop. Even a refurbished / used laptop with a 2nd generation "Sandy Bridge" Core i3 / i5 CPU from 2011 will easily outperform that old laptop.
 
Solution