more help with this hunk of poo lap top

I got an older compaq lap top for net surfing at work or around the house . Good part is it looks good works great . Bad news it only has a phone jack no ethernet connection. Looking around the net I found a few network cards for notebooks and even some USB devices that would allow for ethernet . The bad part is it does not have a CD drive and most of this stuff comes with an install disk . With my desk top I have XP and it pretty much detects new hardware and I don't have to run any install disks . This has windows 2k pro does this detect new hardware also? Any suggestions would help . Is it possible to add a cd drive? Its an armada 7400.

win 2000 has extremely poor support for PCcard or USB
peripherals... if it plugs into the side, you can be assured
that you will need a driver disk.

if you are lucky, then the ethernet card will come with a driver
floppy instead of a driver cd. if not...

solution one is to find the correct driver from the manufacturer
website with your main desktop computer and then put it on a floppy.
all network card drivers should fit on a floppy.

solution two may sound roundabout, but it's a way to get
at least your ethernet driver going if you have no floppies
or inexplicably the company made the install program bigger
than a floppy disk...

borrow a friend's dialup account for 20 minutes... dial in
with the built in modem and get the ethernet driver from
the manufacturer website. i would scout ahead with your
main desktop first, to make sure you can get to it with
a minimum of fuss...

once you have ethernet, then you can use mapped
network drives to install anything else... no need to
shell out for any hardware!

speaking of hardware,
i recommend that you get a PCcard ethernet card, as the USB
eth cards, while cuter, are a little flaky and have much less bandwidth
than PCcard.
you can get armada cdroms and even dvdroms for the 7400
series... cheap too.

I may have an old 3COM PCMCIA card you can have that will be recognized by W2K by default. It's only a 10 mbit card and has an external dongle, but at least it would work. Worst case you could decide what you're going to buy, download the drivers with this crappy card and have it ready for when you do want to upgrade.

I'd make you PayPal shipping to me, if you want it.

Here are some specs I found

#12 it says # MultiBay 24X Max4 CD-ROM, or DVD-ROM
Does that mean It is upgradable or does it have a CD drive that I'm too stupid to find . It took me half an hour to figure out how to use the mouse


http://h18002.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/10015_div/10015_div.HTML

marsteam said:

you can get armada cdroms and even dvdroms for the 7400
series... cheap too.

Click to expand...

I missed this part since my attention span does not allow me to read more than a few words at a time (thus my computer woes) I'll look for a CD drive and or DVD if cheap enough and that would solve my problems . My only thing is I did not pay much for it (nothing really got it in a trade) So I would like to get it running as cheap as possible . I just want to surf the net , but if I could put a DVD in that biatch for a decent price I will go that route .

more +1 from the fat man

so will something like this work ?
will someone retarded (me) be able to install it ? I have installed a DVD drive in my desktop but have never worked with a lap top plus I have fat fingers .

Any good sites to buy this other that ebay ? Would a local (best buy , curcuit city, frys) carry these that way if I fuck up its easy to return and say it was defective .


http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=64477&item=6705002755&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW

Ok so I only found used drives on ebay . Anyone know if anyone sells stuff for older lap tops? New old stock type places? All the stuff on ebay is as is used which is fine if it works . I would hate to take a gamble if there are other places to buy from . Also should this be plug and play because all the drives for sale do not have manuals and or software .


edit : in the mean time this should work and looks like it does not have a CD!

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=39-130-008&depa=0

PS I still need suggestions on a DVD drive

Lap tops are for gays and crippled people.

PS: And I know you're not crippled.

Stinky-Dinkins said:

Lap tops are for gays and crippled people.

PS: And I know you're not crippled.

Click to expand...

correction fancy $3500.00 3 lb lap tops are for gays
1983 20 lb lap tops with dial up are for thugs

FatGuy said:

correction fancy $3500.00 3 lb lap tops are for gays
1983 20 lb lap tops with dial up are for thugs

Click to expand...

They sell correction fancy laptops now? I'm not gay but I'd be lying if I told you I wasn't interested in hearing more (I'd also be lying if I told you I wasn't gay).

I bought a wireless network card that was on sale (belkin) for 20.00 and it came with a CD I tried to copy the files on to floppy but most are too large . Any ideas or should I just return it and toss this damn lap top in the trash? I think I will do the latter
Damn thing is more trouble than its worth . I just wanted the cheap lap top to surf the net and its giving me nothing but grief.

Stinky-Dinkins said:

They sell correction fancy laptops now? I'm not gay but I'd be lying if I told you I wasn't interested in hearing more (I'd also be lying if I told you I wasn't gay).

Click to expand...

I'd be lying if I said I didn't love you.

I bought the cheapest poo network card they had and it worked right away . I did not even have to install anything . Too bad it needs a line , no wireles for me . At least I can take it to work and porn surf.