Report Blog Entry
Dell Inspiron 600M
Released: ~2003
Base Specs
CPU: Intel Pentium M
RAM: 256 MB DDR
Storage: 40 GB HDD (IDE)
Stock OS: Windows XP Home (32-bit / x86)
i managed to find one of these at the flea market for just $5 the other day and i just love this thing. its beautiful and its everything i could ever want in a laptop. for gods sake just fucking look at it. LOOK AT IT!!!!!!!!!!!!
now you might be thinking. "catherine this is a slab of junk from the early 2000s with hardware that couldnt even handle 2 google chrome tabs, what could this piece of shit POSSIBLY have over new laptops?"
two words. repairability and upgradeability. (do not come at me with that "actually thats three words" bullshit "and" does NOT count as one of the two words in this context)
you want more RAM? turn it over, unscrew the cover for the ram compartment, and replace the RAM. more storage space? remove the screw, pull out the tray, and replace the hard drive. wanna upgrade the CPU? it's just under the keyboard, have fun.
oh, did you break the keyboard while trying to upgrade your CPU? no problem, just pop the cover off, unscrew the keyboard, and replace it. easy as pie. your battery won't hold a charge anymore? you can turn it over and just replace it. YOU DONT EVEN NEED A SCREWDRIVER FOR THAT ONE!!!!!
lets see you try that shit on a newer machine. "i want more RAM-" FUCK YOU ITS SOLDERED, SHOULDA BOUGHT 16 GIGABYTES. "i broke my keyboard" HAVE FUN DISASSEMBLING THE WHOLE GODDAMN THING!!!!!!
ok maybe im pretty biased and probably incorrect too but goddammit i wanna have some control over my hardware. i dont care that soldering everything to the board is faster, i dont WANT my laptop to be ultrathin and foldable like origami, and i DONT WANT to have to throw away my laptop and buy a new one just because one part on a good board is fucked. i want my laptop to be reliable for an extended period of time and the trend towards making em thinner isnt helping.
and i dont know about yall but i LOVE extra functionality. i want all the ports. and this joints got HELLA ports. 2 USB-A ports, ethernet, PCCIA card slot, dedicated headphone & microphone jacks, s-video, parallel and serial I/O, AND a CD/DVD drive cuz thats important to me for some reason (and thats considered a "module bay" by dell so theres probably other shit you coulda put in there if you wanted). granted half of that shit isnt even remotely useful in 2024 but its more about the message it conveys: "hey, you can use me for all kinds of things!"
also FOR THE RECORD this thing CAN play games. i can play cs1.6 on this just fine
idk. i just wanted to geek out on something i'm really excited about :3
-catherine
Comments
Displaying 1 of 1 comments ( View all | Add Comment )
Shack Man
Totally agree dude. I'm personally a fan of older Thinkpads (circa late 00's/early 10's). The T430 basically had everything you could ever want in a laptop and kinda beautifully straddles the line between classic and older. Completely swappable CPU/RAM (it was Sandy Bridge Intel if I remember correctly, so third gen stuff), swappable keyboards. It came with a 768p screen out the factory but cricket 1080p IPS panels were compatible with it, I upgraded that back when I had mine. I honestly recommend finding a model yourself if you want that control over your hardware while having the best hardware possible. There is a variant with a fucking NVS 5400 mobile gpu that I could play GTA 5 on no problem, you can even put an i7 in it.