Dell Inspiron 5100 notebook

[Greco101]

I picked it up for 90 bucks today. The audio is dead and the cd drive is broke...

I ordered a new drive today and I'm not in a hurry to fix the audio... My question is... is do these take normal processors?

Are they just as easy to work on as a desktop on the inside?

What are some cheap upgrades I can do for a quick sale? Obviously I'd like to turn the biggest profit possible...

**so far**
bought a new cd drive
have a brand new dell xp pro sp2 disk

I'm thinking the best flop would be to sell it the way it is now, after the new cd drive and a fresh install of xp pro.

cpu (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=190138563103&ssPageName=STRK:MEWA:IT&ih=009)

[Indybird]

First, they don't take normal processors. Though, many times you can buy the mobile processors from places like newegg...

Second, unless you're upgrading RAM, Optical Drives or HDDs then working on laptops is very hard and annoying (many times impossible due to laptop hardware specialization)

Third, the most cost-effective upgrade would be RAM, if you're going to upgrade I'd recommend that.

Hope that helps,
Indybird

[Greco101]

Thanks for the quick response.

cpu (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=190139799819&fromMakeTrack=true&ssPageName=VIP:watchlink:middle:us)

Would that cpu work?

There seems to be a lot of 2.66, 2.8 etc "mobile cpus" for cheap on ebay but it seems...too easy?

[Indybird]

I gotta say, I have no clue. I did a quick search looking for the laptop's processor socket but that was not fruitful. Can't help ya there, lets wait and see if anyone else here knows...

-Indybird

EDIT: It looks like the laptop is socket 478. In that case, the processor you picked out would work but it might not be supported by the motherboard. I don't think theres really any way to see which processors are compatible with the motherboard. If you get it you'll be taking a change, though it most likely will work...

[Crazy Buddhist]

I don't think this laptop takes a mobile processor but a desktop one:

From Dell Community Forums: (http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=insp_upgrade&message.id=31775&query.id=131430#M31775)

"Re: Inspiron 5100 processor?
Yes. So long as the replacement is compatible, ie: a socket 478 P4 @ 533MHz FSB. That is why the 3.06GHz is the max."

And: (http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=insp_upgrade&message.id=49024&query.id=131430#M49024)

"The 5100 uses a desktop P4 Northwood or earlier.
Be careful pushing the system up to far - it overheats as is, and adding a faster CPU may simply hasten its demise. "


From PCWorld (http://pcworld.about.com/news/Jun302003id111390.htm)

"Equipped with Intel's 2.66-GHz Pentium 4 desktop processor, the Inspiron 5100 performed well for its price class, earning a PC WorldBench 4 score of 117. (We've tested relatively few notebooks with desktop processors, but the closest competitor for the Inspiron is a Toshiba Satellite 2455-S305 equipped with a 2.4-GHz chip"

Those are my reasons ^^^ for saying this ... I don't know if Mobile processsors will work in it or not :)

Edit: Addendum (http://www.cpu-world.com/Sockets/Socket%20478%20(mPGA478B).html):

"Upgrading socket 478 motherboards

Even though there are many Pentium 4 and Celeron CPUs that will fit into your motherboard, not all of them may be supported by the board. To determine the fastest processor you can upgrade to you'll need to:

* Determine manufacturer and model of your motherboard,
* Search on manufacturer's website for the motherboard model.

To determine upgrade options for brand name computers (like Dell or HP) try to search for computer model on computer manufacturer website."

CrazyB

[Crazy Buddhist]

Yep .. from the owners guide: (http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/ins5100/en/i5100-om.pdf)

Intel® Pentium® 4 processor
(Inspiron™ 5100)

desktop pentium 4 not a mobile one. Still unsure if you can put a mobile one in it. Try calling Dell?

Here (http://cgi.ebay.com/New-P4-3-06-3-06GHz-512K-533MHz-478-Northwood-HT-CPU_W0QQitemZ280140465682QQihZ018QQcategoryZ80143Q QssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem) is that max speed P4 it will take on ebay $175 apparantly its a rare chip:

"This CPU not only is the fastest desktop 533Mhz FSB Pentium4, but it also is the only desktop 533 Mhz CPU that support Hyper-Threading Technology."

Update:

System Information
System chip set
Intel 845PE (http://www.intel.com/products/chipsets/845pe/index.htm)------ (Inspiron 5100)
Intel 852PM (http://www.intel.com/products/chipsets/852pm/index.htm)------ (Inspiron 5150)

The Intel® 845PE chipset is a discrete graphics chipset developed with DDR333 and optimized to support the Intel® Pentium® 4 processor supporting Hyper-Threading Technology†.

The Intel® 852PM chipset, optimized for the Mobile Intel® Pentium® 4 processor, features a 533 MHz system bus and support for up to 2 GB of high-speed DDR 333/266 memory. An AGP 4X interface enables over 1 GB/s of graphics bandwidth interface for high-quality 2D and 3D video streams.

Yours has the desktop chipset in. It may function with a mobile processor and I have no idea how much the difference in optimisation is in reality.

[crenn]

It won't function with a mobile processor because of the different pin layout, however I have seen a convertor of sorts.

[Crazy Buddhist]

I doubted they would work. But ... even though both are socket 478 they have diffferent pin layouts? Wow. Intel makes things soo easy.

CrazyB


It won't function with a mobile processor because of the different pin layout, however I have seen a convertor of sorts.

[crenn]

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=13388

Not quite, the laptop version has 1 more pin.

If the socket is a 478, then it will work with normal desktop processors.... I think.

[Crazy Buddhist]

It will Northwood 478 up to 3.06Ghz as above ^^^ But there are other chips less expensive that are good too.

Still minorly surprised the socket difference but not really. They aren't the most INTELligent company in the world.


http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=13388

Not quite, the laptop version has 1 more pin.

If the socket is a 478, then it will work with normal desktop processors.... I think.