Adventurous laptop swapping

Discussion
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Hi all, :wave:

I embarked on a very adventurous journey yesterday and I don´t really know what to think of it. :neutral_face:

My ex-neighbour needed my help as she wanted to swap laptops with her daughter.
She has a laptop which I had put Linux Lite 6.4 on at the end of last May.
Her daughter on the other hand has an older one (about 10 ys old) on which I had
put Ubuntu on quite a long time ago.

Swapping laptops involved much work as personal data had to be saved and later put back on the new system etc.

Also: the daughter´s old laptop didn´t run well anymore (see below), so I applied the nuke-and-pave approach and put Linux Lite 6.4 on it as well.

All in all it was a 9 hours job. :blush:

Well here comes the “weird” part:

Whereas the mother´s laptop works very well the daughter´s old one has suffered tremendously in the past. :frowning_face:

According to the daughter she dropped the laptop quite a while ago. After that incident the laptop incessantly gave off sparks.
Finally she decided it would be a good idea to have some “expert” attend the matter. He (or she) somehow managed to wiggle some loose parts out of the device and seemingly decided it should be fine now.

Well, the laptop´s lid seems to have suffered as well as it emits some weird crackling noises when being closed.

After that the daughter found out the charger wasn´t charging anymore and ordered a new one. Whether or not this new one was the correct charger for the laptop she didn´t pay much attention to.
She just used it but found out it didn´t charge properly (or at all?).

So she ordered a new battery, which fit physically, but might not have been the right one for the device either. No real charging effect again.

As a consequence she determined it would be a good idea to swap the laptop. Now, having her mother´s new one she seems happy but the mother is stuck with the “unfortunate” one now. :thinking:

Well, as I said, I installed Linux Lite 6.4. on it, but due to some inconsistency in the power supply (as you can imagine) the installation process didn´t go smoothly.

Twice the internet connection was cut, the installation process suspended and the laptop´s screen went black.
I managed to get it going again by switching the device on two times more. After a minute or so the internet connection was re-established and the installation process resumed. :neutral_face:

All of this happened twice, but magically Linux Lite could be installed successfully. :astonished:

One thing that´s surely not right is a popup window incessantly blinking and providing information about the battery constantly charging and discharging.

It seems the laptop doesn´t get it´s power directly via mains but by the battery only. Yet as the battery is constantly charging and discharging it won´t get much higher than
12 %.
I cannot imagine the poor old laptop can take it infinitely although this seems to have been the method applied by the daughter for some time now. :slightly_frowning_face:
What would you think of it :question:

Is there any future for this laptop at all :question:

Many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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Think it’s time to send it for recycling and raid the bits, you may never get a working solution

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I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the number of missing parts and the installation of wrong parts might just have finished the laptop. If there is a German equivalent to Ebay or NewEgg, used/refurbished laptops are available quite inexpensively. And Chromebooks are also an option. I think the ‘expert’ probably gets most of the credit (debit?) for the death of the machine.

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Agree.

Does it have a HDD, or a SSD?
If it’s about a HDD, and it was spinning while being dropped: it’s a miracle it still works at all. Check its SMART, I bet there will be a heap of errors.
If it’s a SSD, dropping it doesn’t really endanger.

Yes, there is :slight_smile:

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That is definitely the best solution.
Laptop repairs are difficult and expensive.
Might even consider a refurbished desktop… you get more for yor money with desktops, no battery issues, and cheaper repairs.

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I wish I lived closer, I have an old Dell laptop running W11, in need of a home.

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Hi all, :wave:

A big thank you to all of you four comments. :heart:

@callpaul.eu :

You may very well be right in your assessment.
Well, it seems the laptop can´t get any worse, so I guess there´s no harm in running it “somehow”.
It´s quite unbelievable but it still runs Linux Lite´s fresh install. The question is: how long will it be able to keep up with the task… :wink: …

@berninghausen :

Yes, it seems that way. :frowning_face:

That might be a possibility for my ex-neighbour.
Supposedly her daughter even stumbled upon an offer for a new one for 300 €.

@kovacslt :

It´s a HDD (with a capacity of 750 GB).

Right, László.
I don´t know whether the laptop was switched on at the time. But the miracle part is very true anyhow. :wink:

Thanks for the link to eBay.

@nevj :

Thanks for your suggestion as well.

@4dandl4 :

That´s really nice of you, Daniel. Thanks so much. :heart:
But your good old Dell laptop wouldn´t be in good hands with my ex-neighbour, I´m sorry to say.

The thing is: she hates everything IT related. The mere sight of a laptop/PC infuriates her to a huge extent. One time I barely could prevent her from hitting her laptop, being red in the face with rage.
She easily loses her temper with things like that.

The thing is: she was talked into buying two laptops and a smartphone by some dubious “friends” of hers, but as a matter of fact she doesn´t even know how to switch on her laptop… :slightly_frowning_face: .

What I´m trying to say is: I hope you´ll find a better home for your old laptop. :blush:

Thanks to you all. :heart:

P.S.:

I forgot to tell one thing about the laptop in question:

After switching it on, during the boot process, an almost never-ending series of beeps can be heard, staccato-like and very irregularly.
The beeping stops when the booting process finishes and one logs in.

Surely that has some meaning. What might it point to in this particular case :question:

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Your friend would be more suited to an Android Tablet.
I use mine just like a laptop. Much easier, faster startup, touch screen, battery lasts longer, … just dont drop it!

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Thanks for the suggestion, Neville.

In actual fact she once had a tablet for a very short time. Her daughter ordered it for her but it was a mistake.
She wanted to have a laptop instead as she hates tablets even more. She lost her temper and kicked a huge sitting ball against the the wall. Not a pretty sight. :frowning_face:

She never used it once.
Later she had her daughter sell it for 100 € less than she had paid for it.

So there´s nothing to be gained this way…
Sorry.

Cheers from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I think it would beep on start of the charge. Now either the battery is incorrect, or the charging circuit is broken probably because of the drop before…
It starts to charge, but very quickly stops it, and thus you hear that sound.
Other charging symptoms you wrote earlier make me think of that.
Anyway, it’s a severe malfunction.

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Hi László, :wave:

Thanks for the explanation.
That could be it. It never would´ve entered my mind to associate the beeping sound with the start of the charging process.

Yes, quite so.

Thanks again and many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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Rosika:
Your friend is so lucky to have you to turn to when her temper overflows. First, discard every laptop carcass in the house.
Second, buy a Chromebook. My son converted our local school district from Apple to Chromebook. Now every kid has a reliable computer that’s tough enough for kids (and for your friend). They’re close to tantrum-proof, as well.
Best of luck.

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Hi Bill, :wave:

thanks for the comlpliment. :blush:

Sounds like a good idea. Thanks for mentioning it.
But as all this is her business (financially speaking) I may not do as I please. :wink:

As I said earlier, she hates everything IT-related and she even told me her initial hope was giving her (good) laptop away would rid her of the device for good and she could lead a happier life. :neutral_face:

(Well, the “happier life”-part is added by me, but that´s exactly what she meant)

The thing is: everywhere she goes and everything she does, she still keeps giving her email address away. So basically everything is converted to “online” now - from electricity bills to whatever.
She cannot go back to offline anymore…
… and therefore keeps consulting me for anything. I even have to watch her e-mails.

The bottom line is: I have been using her laptop 99 % whereas she might have touched it to an effect of 1 % (optimistically speaking).

Cheers from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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Bleeping is usually a sign of the error, count them and the style then look up on the manufacturer web site to discover the error code.

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Thanks, Paul.

I´m afraid counting is out of the question. These staccato-like bleeping sounds are provided in such a rapid succession that they remind me of (very professional and fast) morse code. :wink:

So nothing to be gained here. I´m sorry.

But as @kovacslt suggested it has surely something to do with the beginning of a charging cycle.

As neither my ex-neighbour nor her daughter are willing to invest in a new (and correct) battery I think there´s not much I can do here.
Well, as I said, the bleeping is just to be heard during the boot process. Once one logs in it stops.
Of course the battery issue still persists.

Thanks again and many greetings
Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I suggest you go to your ex-neighbor and tell her that the laptop she’s getting in trade from her daughter is on its last legs and should not be depended on. Offer her the suggestions others have posted and let her decide what she wants to do. If all she wants to do is read/send email and surf the web, a Chromebook may be the best answer for her, but then, you’re probably the best judge of what she needs. I wish you luck,

Ernie

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Thanks , Ernie, for providing your views on the matter. :heart:

Your advice is certainly very good, at least for an “average” user.

Given her predisposition that would be some progress indeed…

She´s never surfed the web and she´s never read/written any e-mails. In fact she
never switchend on her laptop. :slightly_frowning_face:
She simply doesn´t know how to do that. Neither is she willing to learn.

It´s almost as if she enjoys cultivating her dislike of everything IT-related. :wink:

Sometimes I wonder why she even bothered to buy two laptops and a smartphone… :thinking: .

Despite all that she needs things like that as she converted so many contracts and services to the “online” variant… :astonished:

Many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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In that case, add an option to not get another computer and have her daughter handle her online bills/contracts/services for her. At least, that’s what I’d do. This way she has all the options mentioned before, and this new one to choose from. If she decides to pass on getting a new computer, she should understand that she must depend on her daughter to deal with all her online accounts/bills. She is a big girl, right? If she has a daughter, she’s old enough to learn to do for herself, or depend on family to get things done. Non-family friends/associates/service-providers should never have that responsibility unless they’re being paid to do those things. Of course, what you do going forward is up to you :slight_smile:

My2Cents,

Ernie

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Thanks Ernie. :heart:

Those are wise words indeed.
And you´re perfectly right with anything you say.

I should think so, as she´s in her mid 70-ies.

Thank you very much again for this good advice of yours.

Many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I hope all works out well :slight_smile:

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