[Dell D430] Making an old laptop useful again

[Diederik_Gr]

So this laptop has been gathering dust and I'm willing to upgrade it and make it worth using again, just for internet browsing and some really light work. The first thing i wanted to do was replace the 80GB HDD with an SSD and it isn't easy to find one, apparently the technology of the port is long dead and only one Chinese company appears to make them, they appear to be good drives though, it's just that i need to choose between a 64GB or an 128GB drive, and especially what OS to go with it, I'm looking at Ubuntu or Linux, but can't really think of what would fit the D430 best. I also got an SD card slot available and i think 1 USB port available, so i got room for some external storage.

 

Second is that i have a Molex port available, one next to the WLAN card that apparently has wires soldered onto it and i don't have the equipment to do so. Anything i can use in that port without having to solder?

 

Specs of the D430:

1.2GHz Intel Duo Core 2

2GB DDR2 SDRAM (maximum the motherboard supports)

Intel GMA 950 (GPU)

1280x800 WXGA display

 

So what SSD size and what OS should i get for this laptop, and is there anything useful i can do with the Molex port? Any other suggestions on what do with this laptop are welcome.

[NationsAnarchy]

You can install Ubuntu 14.04 LTS on it, would be decent to use that as something to browse the web or documenting. A 64Gb SSD is probably enough.

[Tedster]

I agree with Nations, but probably Xubuntu, which is Ubuntu but more optimized for older and slower systems.

[NationsAnarchy]

I agree with Nations, but probably Xubuntu, which is Ubuntu but more optimized for older and slower systems.

 

It's Anarchy dude, Nations is like the team tag

Anyway, can you tell me the reason ? I'm using 14.04 as of now and kinda curious about that

[Diederik_Gr]

Alright. I went with the 64GB SSD, any of you guys can tell me what performance i can expect out of an old laptop with Ubuntu. I know i can't expect much, but I'd just like to hear what other people think.

[Aniallation]

Alright. I went with the 64GB SSD, any of you guys can tell me what performance i can expect out of an old laptop with Ubuntu. I know i can't expect much, but I'd just like to hear what other people think.

Why 64GB? Since it's the only drive you'll have, on a laptop really 120GB is recommended.

 

I'd try putting Windows 10 Preview on it, cause why not

[Diederik_Gr]

Why 64GB? Since it's the only drive you'll have, on a laptop really 120GB is recommended.

 

I'd try putting Windows 10 Preview on it, cause why not

I do want the functionality of a full OS and Windows 10 is just a preview. I'm not a big fan of previews either.

 

And there are 2 reasons for the 64GB drive:

-Ubuntu isn't that demanding, Xubuntu (the OS I'm planning to put on it) only requires 4.4 GB of storage

-The 120GB SSD's for this model are seriously expensive, more expensive than a 2.5' SATA SSD (this is a 1.8' SSD for a 40 pin IDE connector)

 

I got an SD card reader as well, so i can go with that if i really need more storage capacity