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Yep, ... I have a Dell latitude laptop that is 6 years old, handed down to me from my kid that graduated college, and he got it as a freshman. Anyway, I really like it, but I have maxed it out as much as I can. But it is dieing from old age. Internal ethernet and wireless have died. I did replace the internal wireless card, but no joy. Sofar it is still cobbling along on a wireless PC card that ubuntu supports. I know it is a matter of time, but I really like the keyboard and for graphics it is one of the best displays I have seen (I am sure there are better, but for a laptop and my aging eyes it is still a joy to use). I suggest start budgeting for a replacement. Put all your Christmas Money in a jar along with all spare change. Give up a late or two a week, and pretty soon there will be enough for a nice gift for yourself in the jar! One thing that has helped me is to have a desktop machine also. In general it is cheaper to upgrade and in more manageable size chunks, at least in my manner of working. I use it as a 'storage server' for the laptop (and even as a backup server for all the systems on our network... I use crashplan to backup windows and ubuntu linux both over the network and locally, it helps for WHEN my old hardware dies. Everything backs up to a 1T disk. I don't currently use their 'cloud based backups' ($150 for 3 years for unlimited storage for home/family use for multiple machines). I keep two or three other 'toy' machines around in various states of running, but they are all on our network and wired in. I use a KVM to get to them. Sorry, I got off track ... again ... I agree a little investment to make it last a reasonable while longer is a good use of resources. Just need to watch 'throwing good money after bad' and hitting the wall on diminishing returns, like I do occasionally. Take care ... Let us know what you do! ... Jack
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