Edit: Unfortunately, the images originally included in this post are gone, because of hosting problems in late 2009. My apologies.

After a brief swing past an electronics store on my way home from work, the ugly little laptop is back in action!

The winning contestant is a Samsung MP0402H, a 40Gb, 5400rpm drive identical to one I owned a couple of years ago (too bad the price wasn’t the same as what I paid a couple of years ago 🙄 ). The repackaging is courtesy of I/O Data, which I’ve found in the past year to be relatively trustworthy.

So far it’s been a performer, but I’ve only had it powered up for about an hour, so I can’t predict its lifespan just yet. dban seems to like it though. 😉

Best part about it this far though, is that it’s completely silent. I catch myself looking over my shoulder wondering if the laptop is still working, because I can’t hear that 4200rpm drive whining. It might take me a little bit to get used to the quiet.

Next stop: A Debian installation, because kerry_s raves about them. I’m trying this one over the network, as you can see, and I anticipate it will take … hmm, I think … forever. 😕