Breathing life back into my old dell latitude

Hellowpplz · May 20

My old dell latitude e5550. 4gb ddr3L ram, i5 5300U, Intel UHD graphics, and a- HOLY COW THAT HARD DRIVE IS SLOW-.

What's the best way to do this. I could easily get another stick of ram and a 2.5" ssd, but also I was wondering if linux could save it alone.

Either way I have to replace it's hard drive sooner or later though because the dell bios and intel rapid storage management are telling me the hard drive is about to die.

Just for a starting reference point, Hill Climb racing hardly runs, and minion rush crashes it after waiting for a few minutes.

tkitch · May 20

I'd toss in 2x8gb sticks of RAM (ddr3 laptop memory is pretty cheap on ebay and other spots: https://www.ebay.com/itm/375327832644 )

And a 2.5" SSD will make a world of difference.

And yes, any decent "not heavyweight" linux distro would be plenty zippy on that for basic use.

May 20

RAM and SSD for sure. The performance you describe is much lower than it should be though. I'm guessing the vents are clogged and the CPU is throttling. It needs a good clean and maybe some new thermal paste.

In terms of Linux you can try Garuda (xfce ONLY, Dr4goniz3d is heavy and so is KDE Plasma) or even lighter go Debian 12 xfce (must have internet during installation to avoid issues later). Garuda has a more straightforward user experience but Debian is lighter.