Yesterday I turned it off and it didn't turn back on (well, the power lights go on but nothing loads). Happy New Year, me! Thanks for catching me at my brokest time of the year.

I found my old one that runs Vista, has 1 GB of RAM, and both feels and smells like it's about to catch fire. Hopefully it'll get me through till I can get some sort of deal on something close to as good as what I had, a 17.3"/500GB/4GBRAM Lenovo that I got for $200 4+ years ago at the long-gone HH Gregg in Arlington Heights, probably because someone ejaculated in the HDMI port or something. If anyone has recommendations on laptop necromancy or where to get good deals on 1600x900-screen laptops with minimal embedded semen, let me know.

Computers. They suck! What are they good for, anyway?

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What's a computer?

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Sex isn't dirty, sex isn't a crime. It's a loving act between two or more consenting adults.

-Hank Kingsley

Shut up, Scout.

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CFMB coming out of the gate strong in 2018, but I don't know that we can keep this Pace up.

Regardless of what you need specifically from the PC, I suggest rummaging through Amazon's collection of certified refurbished machines, you might be able to climb up a notch or two quality wise without having to spend much more than you have.

Here are all their refurb Windows machines, you can parse out your desired specs from here: LINK

Thanks. I can probably justify $379 if I can get four years out of it.

I don't understand the price points of laptops at all, incidentally. They're all over the place and I'm not looking closely enough to know why.

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Hi Lisa, Hi Super Nintendo Chalmers -- meow -- I'm learnding.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKg2ZzPKl2M

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

It was the USB port, and I regret nothing.

Unlikely Semen Bucket

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

Recent Toshibas I bought for kids have been great. Less than 300 I think.

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Elections have consequences.

Look on eBay for latitude e6540

You can get 1080p models for like $300 and they last forever.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

I have a Toshiba Satellite C55 that i have had for a couple of years, I think i spent $250 on it. Wide screen, I am not the biggest fan of the keyboard compared to a Lenovo, but it is OK. I can even do some Visual Studio programming on it.

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

You have to hook up an external monitor to know whether it's the screen or your motherboard. May not be worth fixing, but you won't know until you hook up that external monitor. Also in some cases when computers don't start people sometimes pull the RAM out to see if either stick is defective.

If you can find a decent reseller on eBay you'll probably find a better deal on there. I've bought a couple of computers from these guys: http://stores.ebay.com/Regency-Technologies-Store

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God is the uncaused cause of the universe. He had no beginning and has no end. He is not bound by the laws of the universe he created.

I tried reseating the RAM, but I don't have any other matching RAM on hand to swap it out with. I haven't tried an external monitor yet, though!

EDIT: nope, it's at least the motherboard if not the hard drive

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Well if there are two sticks you can try booting the sticks separately. Booting with one stick would isolate the issue.

It is also possible for a graphics driver to fail in the software or for a graphics chip to overheat. If the hard drive is bad you should still be able to boot to BIOS and then be able to boot to a Linux Live CD or Linux USB jump drive. You have to also look to see if there are any flashing lights or beeps. In some cases the lights on the computer or the beeping sounds are associated with codes that mean for example that your battery is bad.

There is also a reset where you disconnect the battery and the power cord and then hold in the power button. It's usually one of the first things the online forums suggest.

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God is the uncaused cause of the universe. He had no beginning and has no end. He is not bound by the laws of the universe he created.

Thanks, but I ran through all that already. It's dead, Jim.

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Your hard drive is probably fine. If you need data off it get a hard drive enclosure or a sata/ide to usb device.

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God is the uncaused cause of the universe. He had no beginning and has no end. He is not bound by the laws of the universe he created.

Yeah, I ordered an enclosure yesterday. Fingers crossed that the HD is safe but that laptop is probably fried. Too bad, got a lot of use out of it. That laptop was nine months away from retirement.

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Well, I went through Amazon and found a slightly newer model of what I had (same resolution, HDD, RAM), not new, for $237. Thanks for all your help, and if I disappear between now and when it gets here, it's because this beater laptop finally started a fire.

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You know, I did my only live gig in a $50 craptop in midtown Manhattan in 2012. It had a sticker saying "MORE FUN THAN YOU BARGAINED FOR" which I got from Uncle Fun, the old joke/gag store on Belmont thst wouldn't hire me despite me putting https://youtu.be/1-NdvFAeCis on my resume #storyofmylife =\

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Nice to finally be able to move up from Chrome 51 (my old computer couldn't handle whatever the new text-rendering was). I like that the search bar for this site now says "not secure" on the left. I love being reminded of my insecurity when I post here.

I have to get all my muscle memory back because this keyboard is set like three millimeters back of where the old one was, so bear with me if I type like chaspoppcap for a while.

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