So I'm having a ton of troubles with my laptop. The power supply is held together with gum (well, not really) and duct tape (really), the battery only holds about an hour charge, the hard drive failed last Thursday and I had to get a new one, and now I have all kinds of issues, including massive video card problems. I'm gonna try reflashing the BIOS, but I don't have high hopes. I think this machine is on its last legs, and I have to decide whether to get a cheapee replacement for now and figure out a long-term solution later, or just go for a medium-to-long-term solution now. I'm leaning towards the former.

Finally, some humor from the corrupted BIOS:

Heh, that sucks. You said it was a laptop, but don't you have a tablet? Anyway, you've got access to good EE equipment, why don't you try tracking down and fixing the problem? Busted caps can cause problems like that, along with general instability, and you might be able to find and swap out the cap - if indeed that is the problem.

Personally, I would spring for the medium- to long-term solution rather than spring for a cheap solution, as the cheap solution route often ends up costing more money...

Track down what's corrupting the video RAM on my tablet's motherboard-integrated graphics card? No thx.

I'm considering:

1) Patch the problem. New mobo ($200), new battery ($50), new power supply ($20). That's $270 for a patch, and who knows what else will fail next.

2) I like this model; get a new one. EBay has one with 1 bid for $330 and $32 shipping with just under 5 days to go.

3) I'm fond of the HP tc4400, which would be my long-term solution. It tends to run $900-$1100 on eBay, or $1500-$2300 retail.

Edit: anyone have experience with CraigsList? I see this:
http://newyork.craigslist.org/que/sys/345833425.html

The HP tx1000z is a good looking tablet with some solid specs for a low cost machine. It starts at $1,000 (although if you want it to be a touch-screen tablet, it costs an additional $125), but moderately tricked out it is still under $1,500 - certainly cheaper than the tc4400

I'm not gonna post the link in case Googlers try to steal it, but I see a new tc4400 with good specs from a powerseller with 99%+ feedback for a Buy It Now of $899. Since it's in the same state as me, that's $90 tax, and then shippign brings it to an even $1000, which is quite respectable. Considering I have a gig stick of RAM I could install to bring it up to 1.25GB, that's a pretty good machine for a grand.

Sure sounds like it would be. I'm a fan of the newer HP design, though, and not the clunky old "gray box" look of the older ones (including the tc4400) - but if you don't care about that, then go for it. Hey, you could even call it an anti-theft measure. I mean seriously, who would steal something that looks like it came straight out of the '90s?

Meh, I think it looks businesslike and professional, not old-fashioned.

Oh yeah, that is a much better picture than the one on HP's site - that doesn't look too bad at all. ( http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/us/en/sm/WF05a/321957-321957-64295-304455-306995-1847962.html )

What specs are the one you are looking at? I noticed it is available with both the Core Duo and the Core 2 Duo - obviously only the Core 2 Duo is worth even considering