DIY Project – Thinkpad 560x
So I’ve decided to resurrect an old laptop that I bought at a pawn shop in the fall of 2000. An IBM Thinkpad 560x.
I really dug this laptop when I bought it — small, light and yet comfortable to work on. Unfortunately, when i lent it to a friend, she cracked the screen and made it virtually unusable. Over the years, the cmos battery has died, the main battery has died and the small hard drive has become hopelessly inadequate for contemporary Windows programs. But I still have a soft spot for it and love the lightness of the 560x (it has no optical drives built in, which is one reason it’s so light and compact). So I’ve decided to make a go at repairing it and turning it into a linux box. My primary uses for a laptop are centered around writing text and this would be a perfect computer to throw in a bag and head off to a coffee shop for some work on the blog or the novel. I have recently ordered a new screen, a new cmos battery, a new power battery and am waiting to hear about an old external Micro Solutions Backpack CD player/recorder that is on sale through Craigslist. I’ve probably put out about $60 all told. The display came via UPS yesterday. I need to do some in research into what Linux version I should install and I’m also considering buying a 20 or 30 gb hard drive in order to have a little bit of multimedia space.
I will document my process and any setbacks or problems I might have, but I don’t think it’s going to be that difficult a process. If, however, you have any thoughts or ideas about this, please let me know – or if you have an older 2.5″ hard drive you want to donate!
Technorati Tags: computers, diy, thinkpad
You want to load Ubuntu Linux. Really, there’s no other reasonable substitute.
This article has a lot of great insight on running Linux as your primary OS on a machine:
http://consumer.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTI5OCwxLCxoY29uc3VtZXI=