Re: [tlug] NEC Trouble: Fixing Causes versus Treating Symptoms

[Josh Glover <jmglov@example.com>]

On 11/11/05, Lyle (Hiroshi) Saxon <ronfaxon@example.com> wrote:

> Yes... I'm not afraid of open-machine surgery on desktops, but I had a
> small fleet of 486 DynaBook laptop computers before that the floppy
> drives died on one by one - and at one point I came into possession of a
> 486 DynaBook with a (physically) broken screen but nearly new everything
> else, so I tried to transplant the good floppy drive from it into one of
> the other (identical model) DynaBooks.  I was dismayed at how difficult
> it was to get the thing out... I did it, but I ended up physically
> damaging the parts machine to it.  When I got to the install phase in
> the working DynaBook, I found myself faced with the same barriers and
> didn't want to break up a still working machine, so I abandoned the
> attempt.

Working on laptops takes experience, patience, tiny screwdrivers, and
a surgeon's steady hand. I possess all of these qualities, plus an
extensive amount of free time, and as such, might be willing to help
you out if a certain brand of dark Irish beer was guaranteed to be
present for post-surgery recovery.

> What sort of life expectancy is typical for a laptop hard drive running
> 24 hours a day?

It varies, just like desktops. There are good hard drives and bad,
good manufacturers and bad, good batches and bad. I had an seven year
old IBM ThinkPad with the original drive, humming along as pretty as
you please, but the hard drive on my two year old refurbished Dell
Inspiron 600m just went south.

> I probably should change the performance settings so that the machine can give the hard
> drive a rest while the machine is just idling.

Yes indeed. Take a look at the thread wherein SJT and Tobias were
rapping about noflushd and Linux 2.6. As the archives are currently no
up to date, I can forward you Tobias's email if you need. Hit me
offlist. The crux of it is
/usr/src/linux/Documentation/laptop_mode.txt

Cheers,
Josh