Breathing new life into a Dell Inspiron 1720

[Joe Blough]

Hello:

I inherited an old Dell Inspiron 1720 notebook. Currently it runs Windows Vista, has a 2GHz Core2Duo CPU, 2GB RAM, and a 160GB 5400rpm hard drive.

I'm thinking of maxing out the RAM to 4GB and putting an SSD into it, and installing Linux on it.

The RAM upgrade is pretty straight-forward. But I'm wondering about the SSD. I've read conflicting posts online, some say that you can only put a maximum of 500GB, split between two drives, on this notebook; others say the sky is the limit. Does anyone know for sure? Crucial's memory/SSD advisor seems to suggest that you can put up to a 1TB SATA SSD in it. Could I put a 480GB Intel 540 SSD into it? (A local computer shop has them on sale this week.)

 

[postmortemIA]

I'm not sure what's the point of storing so much data on that device. It can't play 1080P h.264 movies with that CPU. SATA standard on it is rev I, so max 150MB/s read/write times.

480GB will work most likely, and every SSD on it will perform fine, much better than HD, but still it will work way below its specs due to outdated SATA.

IMO I wouldn't spend more than $50 updating it

 

[JWade]

well the 1720 supports c2d 800mhz bus speed processors, the t9300 works in it fine, its 2.5ghz and 800mhz bus, currently I think on ebay for $18 shipped. that as well would be a good cheap upgrade with the ram and ssd.

 

[Joe Blough]

What's the fastest CPU I can fit into the Inspiron 1720? I'm guessing a T9500, but I'm also guessing the best bang-for-buck is the T9300 (cheaper on ebay, and I'm only losing 100MHz speed).

 

[daxzy]

Although its a fun project, I wouldn't spend too much money on it. I had an Asus notebook with a T9600/Radeon 4650, and it was not cutting it... mainly in watching videos, casual gaming, and the relatively noisy fans (I did take it apart and removed the dust).

I replaced it with a Lenovo T430s (i5-3320/4GB/240GB SSD/near perfect physical condition) for $250 shipped off eBay. $100 more and you can buy a new outlet Haswell/Broadwell/Kaveri laptop (I needed an optical drive). That's a much better investment for longevity, IMO.