The Frugal Propellerhead Family's Great 2014 Computer Upgrade

The great 2014 technology (mostly computers) upgrade is now over. WOW, it was a crazy and fast ride..... kinda like the Texas Giant roller coaster! 

Many of you will remember the late spring when I moved my desktop workstation to an Ivy Bridge "Core" system built in the ginormous Cooler Master Cosmos II case. At the time, we were a Core 2 Duo family. The workstation was a "Yorkfield" Core 2 Quad, myself and daughter on ThinkPad X301/X61 running low/ultra-low voltage C2D, wife and son on ThinkPad T61s running regular mobile C2D. 

Around that time, I came across a ThinkPad T500 locally that was too cheap to pass up (sub-$100), so it began. While these machines are "Montevina" platform running Intel's Penryn processors and thus NOT the later Westfield, "Core" processors, there's not a huge difference in routine performance. Especially when you load them with plenty of RAM and run the OS on an SSD. The whole thing really gained momentum a few weeks ago when I picked up a cheap T400 on Goodwill's auction site (yes there is such a thing). It had some issues such as a couple of broken USB ports, but at $42, I wasn't going to complain! 

For those who aren't aware, the T400 is the 14.1" version of the T500 (15.4" LCD) with universally integrated Intel graphics vs. the switchable ATI Radeon HD 3650 GPU and higher end panels that can be optioned. Around the same time, while MacBook Air shopping on Craigslist (not for myself), I spotted a T500 for $75 complete with the Advanced MiniDock. Yes, I did say $75! That's just stupid cheap! So, I picked it up last weekend on my great Metroplex swing through Arlington, Kennedale, Bedford and Dallas (more on this later). 

And of course, right in the middle of this mash-up came the X1 that replaced my X301. So, are you wondering how I can afford to do this on a teacher's salary? After all, we're talking $1000+ retail on every one of these machines with the X1 over $2000! 

Ahhh.... that's the money question if you'll pardon the pun. First of all; know your market. Secondly; know your products. And thirdly, be ever watchful and ready to strike when the opportunity arises. So, let's start at the beginning:

• I know that working computers can always be sold, it's just a matter of what it is, which governs how much it can be sold for. Pretty much any laptop running a recent OS can sell for about $100.... give or take. In this case-in-point, the T61 machines sold for between $125 and $150, which is exactly what I sold my son's machine for. While the Z61t (daughter's laptop) being older and slower, with a bad battery sold for the $100 that I asked. So, that gives me $250 to upgrade. The other half of the market is that the newer T400/500 can and do often appear for under $100 if one is patient.
• The Montevina platformed T400/500 are in a number of ways significantly faster and better machines than the T61 that they replaced, while at the same time take the same drives, batteries, A/C adapters, docks etc. However, they use a faster bus, run the next gen "Penryn" Core 2 Duo processors, and uses the DDR3 memory that I want standardize our home machines onto. This RAM come in a higher density per module and are thus cheaper to buy. Whatever the cost is for a size (1Gb, 2Gb, 4Gb) memory I can buy in DDR2 is close to the next size up in DDR3. I also know that in my 8 year old daughter and 11 year old son's computing world, the spec of these machines is more than enough for their needs. After all, we're talking YouTube and Minecraft. So, even the Intel integrated GPU version of these machines is plenty. 
• Now that I had a known target and money in hand from selling their old computers, I was ready to catch the $42 (about $70 after shipping) T400 on Goodwill and the $75 T500 on Craigslist. All-in-all, I spent less than $150 for an complete upgrade, netting me a +$100, in the exchange. Where did that $100 go? Into upgrades of course! The T500 that Josh got received an Intel 160Gb SSD over the 64Gb SSD that was in the T61. The T61 went away with a 160Gb mechanical hard drive that was originally in that machine, so the SSD is sitting in my drive box awaiting future use. The 64Gb SSD in Katie's machine went into her T400. She doesn't need a lot of storage, but I'm afraid that Minecraft and other 11 year old games will be too much for his old SSD. That 160Gb upgrade cost $55, so I'm actually still on the plus side of the ledger! Even the Advanced MiniDock that was included with the T500 came into play as we can now move his speaker plug from the unfortunate front position to the rear.

But what about this? OK, I'll admit it. It was a "one-off", one of those ridiculous deals that sometimes still happen on eBay. I got it at $305, so about $330 after the rather high shipping, but still a very low price. I'm selling my X301, complete with it's 160Gb Intel SSD, and 8Gb of RAM for $300 while including my spare no longer needed batteries. If I wasn't selling to my friend who's been lusting after it for a long time, I'd price the machine (downgraded to 4Gb of RAM and 128Gb SSD) for about $375-400 which is completely doable. I'm doing this because, he and I have been friends for a LONG time. And, it's where my personal ThinkPads go to live out their retirement (T23, T42p, X41, X300 and now X301). 

Before I close out of this long post, I'll go back and explain what I was doing last Saturday.... instead of writing blog posts. Besides the T500, I also went out to pick up a iPad Mini 2 (aka Mini Retina) for my wife to go into her fleet. Yes, for those who are counting, that's 6 iPads that we own and 7 that are used on a regular basis including the iPad 2 that her school provides! I promise, I'm going to write a post just on our little brood of these things soon! Oh, I also stopped by and visited with one of my favorite YouTube video makers who goes by iBookGuy. It was a great visit and will make its way into a future post as well. In any case; now you know how the great upgrade of 2014 came about to be and how it was done, at a pretty low cost.