Is this laptop worth saving?

[Gil Bang 26230]

So several years ago I won a big dell laptop in a work contest.  About 2014 or so.  It's got a big display.  It's great as a desktop but it's too damn big to use as a laptop, so I have a chromebook that I carry with me. 

Anyway, I'd like to start using the dell again at my desk, but it's on windows 8.1 which I believe isn't secure, and also it acts weird sometimes and I've gotten messages that the hard disk is damaged, although it still seems to work fine.

I'm not a geek, but I figured out how to pull up the specs:

Windows 8.1

Intel Core i7-3632QM cpu

RAM 8.0

System type: 64 bit X64 based processor.

 

Should I keep this thing?  Should I upgrade it?  I assume windows 10?  Should I get a solid-state drive?   How much will all this cost?

 

Any geek help will be appreciated.  I like the hardware as far as keyboard, display, etc. 

[crash_davis 23468]

It comes down to what you want in a laptop. It's 3rd gen ICore product so that thing is OLD. However, if all you are doing is surfing, spreadsheets, and watching videos, that thing is more than capable. I'm using an I7 3rd gen desktop and have no desire to upgrade. It's hot as shit but ehhh, it's old and inefficient. It's handles everything I throw at it.

Upgrade cost: 

8 Gig ram: $30

250GB SSD: $40

Maybe new battery: $60

Total cost $70-130 and you can use that for another 5 years.

 

Or spend $400 on a newer, lighter, prob better display, better battery life laptop that will last you for another 10 years. They both will do the same thing. The second may be a few seconds faster doing it.

 

[TXLNGHRN10 341]

You could definitely put a new SSD hard drive in it, load windows 10 on it and it will be plenty fast for normal home use. 

[Gil Bang 26230]

Found a local guy.  He sent me an amazon link for a SSD, and once it arrives, he will  install for 70 bucks.  Seems fair enough to me.  
Thanks gents.  

[crash_davis 23468]

11 hours ago, Gil Bang said:

Found a local guy.  He sent me an amazon link for a SSD, and once it arrives, he will  install for 70 bucks.  Seems fair enough to me.  
Thanks gents.  

There should be plenty of YouTube videos of teardowns of your specific model. Physical swapping of the ssd should be easy. The harder part is the cloning which isn't hard. The software is free. 

[Parliament 14593]

Yeah do it yourself.  Have fun learning something. 

[Gil Bang 26230]

OK, it looks as though replacing the drive is easy.

I've retrieved the files that I need on a USB drive.

So, I download windows 8.1 on another USB drive, install the new SSD, boot off the USB, and I'm in business?  

[Gil Bang 26230]

Or, do I create a recovery drive from the computer before swapping the drives?   Which is better?

[Gil Bang 26230]

or just go here?

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows8ISO

Edited August 19, 2021 by Gil Bang

[MissingInAction 25554]

Win 8.1 is EOL which .means it isn't secure.

[crash_davis 23468]

did you get it sorted out?

cloning the disk shouldn't matter what Win OS you are on. once you get the clone image to your ssd and boot up, then I would worry about upgrading to W10.

the cloning part can be "tricky" if the HD and SSD are difference sizes, although in my experience it's an issue going from larger HD to smaller SSD. You may need to change the partition sizes to make sure that the windows systems and recovery partitions are as large or larger than what they are now. 

[dcbc 14644]

You could load Chrome OS onto it and it would run a bit faster.

Edited August 20, 2021 by dcbc

[Gil Bang 26230]

OK, so here's the plan.  I pulled another laptop off the shelf.  Also a dell, inspiron 14.  It has a full hard drive.  It was so slow that I quit using it.  So, the plan is to use it as test run for the drive swap.  If I'm successful, I'll order another SSD and do the better laptop.  If I fuck it up, no big deal, because it was in a drawer anyway.  

I've ordered the USB cord for the cloning thing, and it should arrive today.  Then, I give it a whirl. 

[gsoda3 3362]

You're not gonna mess it up unless you physically damage it.

[Gil Bang 26230]

3 hours ago, gsoda3 said:

You're not gonna mess it up unless you physically damage it.

It's obvious that we've never met. 

[Superhero 9017]

I WISH I had a i7-36xx chip in my rig. Keep it, swap out the hard drive for a SSD, and add RAM if possible and definitely update to Windows 10. I think it's still free to update.

I'm rocking an 10 year old i7-2600 Dell. With the consult of some people this board, I swapped out the HD for a SSD and increased RAM to 8GB to 16GB. Now it runs as smooth as butter. Boots up quicker and seems faster than my work HP laptop (HPs are shit BTW). I can still run some first person shooter games on it.

 

 

[Gil Bang 26230]

22 hours ago, Gil Bang said:

OK, so here's the plan.  I pulled another laptop off the shelf.  Also a dell, inspiron 14.  It has a full hard drive.  It was so slow that I quit using it.  So, the plan is to use it as test run for the drive swap.  If I'm successful, I'll order another SSD and do the better laptop.  If I fuck it up, no big deal, because it was in a drawer anyway.  

I've ordered the USB cord for the cloning thing, and it should arrive today.  Then, I give it a whirl. 

Update:  The laptop worked, but the motherfucker HAD NO HARD DRIVE.  Literally an empty square.  WTF?   The model was Inspiron 14-3452.

I remember the story now.  A few years back I was vacationing and didn't think I'd need haul my laptop as nothing was going on at work.  Then work shit blew up, so I had to run out and buy something cheap to handle emails and some contract stuff.  Chromebooks weren't as popular then, and I ended up with this thing.  It got me through the vacation and I never used it much after that. 

 

[Gil Bang 26230]

So I was having some difficulty getting the clone software to work, because it wasn't recognizing.  GF's son stopped by and said I'm a dumbass because I didn't initialize the drive.  He did that, and now it's copying over. 

[DougO 5264]

Should be useable. And it doesn't have shittyass Windows 10 on it, which is a major plus.

[Gil Bang 26230]

I'm typing this on the subject Dell.  DONE!

Thanks everybody for the encouragement. 

[Gil Bang 26230]

So now what do I do?  Do I need to run updates and shit like that?

 

[immamac 44317]

Yeah and if you can still upgrade to 10 for free do that. I bet with the sad it runs an order of magnitude faster. 

[Gil Bang 26230]

11 minutes ago, immamac said:

Yeah and if you can still upgrade to 10 for free do that. I bet with the sad it runs an order of magnitude faster. 

So, upthread I talked about the other laptop.  It was on Windows 10 Home Edition.  

Assuming I can't upgrade for free, can I use the serial number for windows for the computer I just tossed?

[immamac 44317]

Yes

[Gil Bang 26230]

So I went to install windows 10 and the installation failed, twice. 

I didn't see exactly when it crapped out.  Last I looked it was 74% complete, then next time I look the message is that the install failed.  
Now what do I do? 

[crash_davis 23468]

W10 is tied to the hardware. If you are trying to load a backup from a different laptop, it will probably fail.

[Gil Bang 26230]

12 hours ago, crash_davis said:

W10 is tied to the hardware. If you are trying to load a backup from a different laptop, it will probably fail.

No.  Clean download directly from Microsoft.