i like computers.
Hello people of Internetland! Today I come to you with another PC from the thrift store.
If I'm honest, I'm still not sure what it is, but I'm a simple man; If I see a computer at the thrift store, I buy it.
It appears to be an IBM server-ish PC from around the year 2000.
Inside was a mess of ribbon cables and old paper, including the manual for some Intel desktop boards. If it's for this computer, it probably has a Pentium III or Celeron. Also included was an extremely dusty board layout diagram, showing that the motherboard could optionally have a VGA and RJ45 port. This one doesn't have those, which is what the two cards are for.
The motherboard has three DIMM slots, which I find interesting. I'm not too well versed in old computers, so idk if this was common or why there's an odd number of slots.
The hard drive is a Seagate Medalist drive, 7200 RPM, 6.5GB. Also, anyone know what the three things in the 5.25" bay are? All are the same, except only the one in the middle has something in it. They all have a fan, and they appear to say "KWI" on the front. I'm thinking those are swappable hard drive things, but unsure as of right now.
The computer is quite dusty and dirty. I'm not convinced it was ever cleaned, or at least not within the past 20 years. I'm also keeping an eye out for spiders, 'cause I'm irrationally arachnophobic. Haven't found any yet. Yet.
Does anyone know exactly what this is? I couldn't find anything online that looked like this.
This computer is the second IBM computer I own (other is ThinkPad R51), third computer I bought from this thrift store (other is ThinkPad and Thrift Store PC Sr.), and the new oldest computer I own (previously an OptiPlex GX280, still need to share info on that one).
Thanks for reading!
#thrift store pc #thrift store computer #thrift store #thrifstorefinds #ibm #server pc #2000 #pentium iii #computer #mystery #what is this #pc #old computer #server #Add tags...
UPDATE: Computer is not IBM. Imposter IBM. Also no spiders.
[fun fact: at this point, the laptop had already been thrown out the window of a moving car onto asphalt in a parking lot in the rain]
[see this video]
yeah so uh funny story
about a month after this
i was trying to make it into a pizza box laptop (ish)
and the super io chip caught fire
so i dont think the laptop is ever gonna work again
but hey
now i have an ikea fake display laptop
also heres the close ups of the motherboard
it sure is a laptop motherboard (DA0P9MB16D0 REV: D)
(HP Stream 14-ax010wm w/ Intel Celeron N3060, 4GB DDR3L-1600 RAM, 32GB eMMC storage, aka complete garbage especially when they expect you to run Windows 10)
#hp #hp stream #i hope that ninja-jock-bot sees this #but i dont know how Tumblr works #(they asked for motherboard close ups)
Can you tell I like computers? Can you tell I'm autistic? I hope so!
Welcome back fuckers to this tumbly tumble dryer I claimed as my own. Today's garbage fire wonders if there's a difference between a tumble dryer and a normal dryer.
So a couple weeks ago, after putting an extra 4GB of sketchy eBay RAM into it, my 2007 no-name custom-ish PC I got for $6.25 from the thrift store was ready to exist a little better than 1GB of RAM. Because my autism desires stupid bullshit, I decided I must try to use it online. One problems, however: I haven't any ethernet to my room because I'm a bitch. Now, I could solve this with a USB WiFi adapter, but the computer hates it and refuses.
Instead of doing the sensible thing and giving up, I decided it needed to get stupider. I present to you: stupid computer shenanigans.
What you are witnessing is a short ethernet cable connecting the PC to a 2013 Dell business laptop to steal its internet for its own personal gain.
And it works!
They always say that, "if it works, it isn't stupid," but this is still stupid.
It was such a pain to get working. It's almost as if computers don't usually steal WiFi from a laptop running a different Windows version. It took quite a while of trying to setup networks on the PC and allowing it to take WiFi on the laptop. But, eventually, it connected.
Firefox no longer works with Windows 7, but thankfully I have an old version of Firefox from 2022 laying around and it works.
The experience was... not fast. It's almost like it's siphoning internet from a laptop through garbage nonsense and trying to render it with a Core 2 Duo and 5GB of DDR2-800 RAM. But hey, it worked! It was stupid, but it worked! Surprisingly, it wasn't the worst online experience I've ever had. Have you tried to use the internet on a 2DS or Wii U? No, of course you haven't! And if you have, shut up.
ok thats all thanks for coming to my me talk
#pc #computers #stupid shenanigans #shenanigans #windows 7 #ethernet #garbage #firefox #aaaaaaaaaa #if it works then it isnt stupid #even though it absolutely is stupid #uhskdhf9eruistune98sidzdza
Welcome back fuckers to my tumble dryer. Today's garbage fire wonders how long I can keep this mostly-upbeat, mostly-grammatically-correct tone going.
A few days ago, I went to my local thrift store looking for one of those big 5-disc CD changer things that no one wants. I walked out of that store with one laptop and no CD changer.
I bought this IBM ThinkPad R51 for $24.99.
There was also a Panasonic Toughbook, but I don't want to spend $69.99 right now.
After getting it home, suffering to get it open, and viewing the very intact thermal paste,
...suffering to put it back together, likely breaking some things, and having a screw left over, it workie!
Complete with personal files, sensitive information, and a probable virus! Yippee!
But yeah. It a ThinkPad. Intel Celeron M 350, 512MB DDR1-333, 40GB HDD, Win XP Pro, good screen, 2005.
Was this worth it? Eh. Do I have one more ThinkPad than I did before (zero)? Yes. Do I have a 5-disc CD changer? Still no.
#thinkpad #ibm thinkpad #thinkpad r51 #thrift store #thrift store pc #laptop #windows xp #another tag goes here
i havent complained about this on here yet, so
HP 14t-bs000 laptop
in the same market as the HP Stream laptop, this laptop (which doesnt have a product name for some reason)... fucking sucks. so much.
i used this piece of shit (which im currently typing this on) nearly every day for at least a year, so im comfortable with saying this is the worst computer ive ever used.
for all you tech people out there, here are the specs:
HP 14t-bs000 1DN87AV laptop
Intel Celeron N3060 @1.60 GHz, 2 cores, 2 threads
4GB DDR3L-1600 PC3L-12800S Non-ECC RAM
32GB eMMC storage
Intel HD 400 Graphics 1GB RAM 1366x768 60Hz display
Windows 10 Home
for those of you in the know, you might already see the problem(s)
so
using this laptop every day was hell
imagine being in 2020
and doing school online
alas, this computer is all you have
what do you do? suffer
this laptop is slow. extremely slow.
i can hear the intel celeron (intel celery) in this laptop begging for mercy every time i power it on
this processor is worse than one from 17 years ago (10 years in 2017)
im not kidding
this (2017) celeron n3060 performs worse than the (2007) core 2 duo i found in a $6 pc i got at the thrift store
and it sure as hell feels that way
you better have patience and a lot of it
half the time i cant tell if its actually doing anything
this celery stick of a cpu makes browsing the internet a pain
which is a problem because that's what this computer was made to do
[on a slightly unrelated note, the keyboard randomly stopped working while i was typing that]
much like the cpu, the ram also sucks. 4gb is barely enough to run windows 10. it functions, and i appreciate that hp lets you upgrade it up to like 8gb, but its still not good.
the screen.
no.
ok so, congratulations hp, you somehow invented the worst screen ever. good job.
it has god awful viewing angles, and i use "viewing" in jest because you cant see this screen
for some reason, hp decided it would be a good idea to have a glossy screen, making this more of a tinted mirror
supposedly, this makes for better colors, but that doesnt matter WHEN I CANT SEE THE GOD DAMN SCREEN
hp also supposedly made a matte finish screen for this line of laptops, but i cant find a single one
so yeah, screen sucks, but it is a very light annoyance compared to the storage
32 GB of storage. Need I say more?
32 GB is nothing. I shit you not, the damn operating system takes up more than 2/3 of the storage. That is unacceptable.
How the fuck do you expect the average person to deal with this? You install one program and Windows is already complaining. The average person sees the low storage notification and runs into the wilderness with their doomsday supplies.
If you want this computer to be usable in any way, you need an SD card or an SSD (we'll get back to that in a minute).
I'm sorry, is it too much to ask HP Inc (ranked #63 on the Fortune 500 list) for a laptop that's usable out of the box? It's fucked up that you can sell laptops with that little storage in the modern day. 32GB is already awful, but to only have roughly 10 GB actually usable? You can install a couple apps and download a few files before you're completely out of space. At a certain point, you can't update Windows or even browse the internet until you clear up some storage. Was 64GB too much to ask for? Even that isn't a lot, but it's usable! You can install things without immediately running out of space, a concept HP clearly hasn't heard of.
"Yeah, the laptop sucks, but who gives a shit? It's a bottom-of-the-barrel laptop, what did you expect?" I EXPECT IT TO BE FUCKING USABLE. The average person doesn't know much about computers. They see a low price and immediately bite, not knowing they just opened a pit into hell. They start using it, notice it's extremely slow, learn they can't download shit, give up, and leave it in a closet for 20 years.
I understand that this laptop, $150 to $250 when new, was not expected to be good. I know. I'm just asking for usability. The fact that HP thought it was acceptable to sell this thing is further proof that HP fucking sucks. The very existence of this laptop defies God. This laptop's manufacture infamously lead to the Third Crusade. This laptop is the Antichrist.
ok ok ok
yes
im being overly dramatic
i know
but
i cannot stress enough how horrible this laptop is to use
there are school laptops better than this
in fact
I have used at least 2 different school laptops that are better to use than this
Dell Latitude 3190
Intel Pentium Silver N5030 @1.10GHz, 4 cores, 4 threads
8GB DDR4-2400 RAM
128GB eMMC
Intel UHD Graphics 605
Windows 10 Education
Comparing this laptop to the HP laptop is like comparing a desk to a [pile of rusty] nails
This Dell laptop is so god damn usable
like
it has storage!
it has ram!
it has a processor!
if you removed all of the school web filters and whatnot, you'd get a low end (but more than usable!) laptop
and they just gave these out! [i got one for free for graduating, which i'm currently using to add this post to my website]
like i said, this hp laptop is worse than a school laptop
another school laptop
Dell Chromebook 3110
Intel Celeron N4500 @1.10GHz, 2 cores, 2 threads
4GB LPDDR4-2933 RAM
32GB eMMC
ChromeOS
while yes, these are basically the specs of the HP laptop, it doesn't feel that way
when they stole the other dell laptop from us and gave us this thing as a consolation prize, I was pissed
however, it feels fine, mostly because it's a chromebook
chromeos takes up less resources, less space, doesn't need anything fancy
plus, i think intel recently improved their celeron processors so that they aren't outperformed by decades-old processors (i dont have a source for this)
in any case, it still feels usable
This is not good for HP. In popular culture, school laptops are stereotypically fucking atrocious. Yet, somehow, HP managed to make something worse.
there are computers from 10+ years ago for half the price on ebay that are leagues ahead of this sinful pile of plastic
im sure you can find much better deals than this online
please
if you need a laptop
and dont care about its specs
please dear god dont buy this laptop or similar ones still sold
find something on ebay
save up a bit more for something better
whatever it takes to not get this laptop
this laptop
has caused me so much fucking frustration
so much anxiety
i wouldnt wish this laptop on any of my enemies
ok
redeeming qualities:
it technically functions
and its easy to work on
which is a good thing
because if you actually plan on using this rattly lump of lead and depression, you definitely want to upgrade some things
this laptop comes from a line of better laptops, so luckily theres a lot of easy upgradability
for one, all of the screws are easily accessible and the bottom of the laptop comes off relatively easily, plus it has an easily removable battery
for two, half of the laptop comes highlighted in blank
see those shiny metal plates on the left side? thats called opportunity
for that is not useless space, it is expansion
on the left is mini-SATA, and the right is regular SATA
to the average jim, this doesnt mean anything
but if you're in the know, you'll know that you can use these for SSDs, HDDs, and optical drives
yes, some of these laptops came with actual storage
better yet, you can use these!
so i bought the cheapest 256gb ssd that micro center sold, and instantly octupled (8x) the storage capacity
(depending on how you count it, i may have nontupled [9x] the storage)
and all of a sudden, the laptop is usable!!!
still slow as shit, mind you, but i can store files! i can install programs without fear! using the analogy from earlier, its like turning the rusty pile of nails into a small table
I have also upgraded the ram to 8GB
it didnt make it much better, but its the thought that counts
with this newfound power, im tempted to get the optical drive, an internal fan (because it currently doesnt have one and can get hot, and even a new motherboard with a better processor
ok so
In conclusion, this laptop fucking sucks and the fact that HP sold any of them is a testament to God's weakness. However, it can be improved. But it still fucking sucks, fuck you HP.
#hp #hewlett packard #rant #complaining #ranting #laptops #bad laptops #long rant #i joke a lot but this laptop does suck so much and i hated every second i had to use it with no better alternative.
UPDATE: This laptop is no longer functional. A capacitor was knocked off the board while trying to remove a stripped screw from the "heatsink". If you have soldering skills and are local somehow, feel free to contact me.
I got a working computer from the thrift store for $6.25 USD (including tax)
specs for nerds:
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 @ 2.66GHz
1 GB DDR2-800 SDRAM Non-ECC RAM
256 GB HDD
Windows 7 Professional (according to the sticker on the side, it originally has Windows XP Professional)
CD/DVD drive
Intel DG33FB motherboard (I found a manual for it on the CIA website)
things that don't work:
CD/DVD drive (wasn't plugged in, the sata cable going to it was plugged into another sata port on the motherboard) (when trying to open the tray, makes two clunks then gives up)
Audio (doesn't detect any speakers)
Network (no WiFi antenna, my USB TP-Link refuses to work, I haven't any ethernet cables)
CMOS battery (thinks it's currently 2006)