A few questions pertaining to an older Laptop.

[mercyfulfate2010]

Hello guys, I am hoping some of the tech wizards here can share some knowledge with me on a topic that has been bugging me for quite some time. Part of the reason for me waiting so long it is out of embarrassment of my stupidity. Another is just pure apathy, anyways here goes.

In 2006 I got a new laptop. It was an Alienware Aurora that at the time was pretty beastly for my needs. It was not something I purchased myself, my parents got it for me, and I pretty much just went online and clicked all the best options on the finder. Knowing now what I know about cost effective machines, it sickens me to think about the price tag on said laptop. The laptop eventually ran into a few problems, I played WoW on it constantly for 12-16 hours a day (second admission of shame) and the ole girl finally gave up the ghost.

There are two things wrong with it that are preventing its normal use. The first is a strange white line that goes down the middle of the screen, it is maybe one inch thick and extends straight down a little over from the right side. The second being, it needs a new hard drive. My main question, is it even worth repairing and selling now? Or is it essentially best left to toss out? I am not completely sure what the cost for repairing such a thing would be, nor do I even fully know what it is worth. With as fast as things change in the computer world, I would not even be shocked if it had no value. Going to post some specs and hoping someone can shed some light on it. Thanks in advance for your help!

Processor: AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ with Hyper Transport and Dual Core Technology
OS: XP Service Pack 2
LCD Display: 17 inch with built in cam
Motherboard: VIA K8T890 + VT8237A Chipset
Memory: 2GB Dual Channel DDR SO-DIMM at 400 MHZZ - 2 X 1024MB
Video Card: 256 MB Nvidia GE Force Go 7800 GTX
HD: 80GB 7200 RPM SATA
PRM DVD/CD: 8X Dual Layer DVD+/-RW / 24X CD-RW
Second: 8X DVD combo

It also has a steel laser engraved laptop case that I have a sickening suspciion is worth more than the laptop currently is .

Thanks you again for the advice.

 

[striker410]

Hi! Welcome to the forums.

Interesting request! No need to feel any shame, most of us here are fellow gamers

I'll tackle the first issue, the one I know the least about.
Not sure what caused the line through the screen. since it's so wide, I'd guess something went wrong in the connector. Could be it's just loose, could be it's busted. I don't know much about screens, might post over in the Laptops section, or the Graphics & Displays, they might give you a better idea of what's wrong.

I can tell you about the value.
It's running on an old graphics card, and an old CPU. Very old. If you can fix the screen, it might be worth sticking a $60 HDD in there, just to have. It will NOT be playing the latest games, however. The 7800GTX (not the mobile version even) gives about half the performance of an 8800GT (I think, off the top of my head) which means you'll struggle to play the simplest of games.

Sorry I couldn't help more :/ Cheers!

 

[mercyfulfate2010]

Yeah, even in a world of technology that is quickly outdated, it is still very old. I had a feeling that it might not even be worth the cost to repair it. Just a bit of a sickening feeling when I think back of how much it cost haha.

Thanks for the words of wisdom.