Is This A Good Deal?

I had a laptop thread started, but now I have a friend selling me one for what I think is cheap.

Remember, all I really need it for is word processing, e-mail and internet. Basically so I can freelance and file remotely from ball parks, arenas, etc. I'm not photoshopping, laying out pages, etc. on this thing.

Here's the details on the laptop:

Dell C600 laptop.
Pentium 3 processor - 750Mhz
256 megs of RAM
Windows XP SP2
External wireless card
Two mice (one brand new in the package to have as a spare as well as an external keyboard)
A docking station so I can put the laptop in it and plug any devices into it on your desk (i.e. external keyboard, mouse, monitor)
Some network cables for hardwire connection.
Laptop case (although I already have one)
It does have one USB port, which is a good thing.

He's asking $150 for all the above.

I trust the guy (he stood in my wedding) and I trust his computer knowledge (he went to school for it, is an IT guy for a major auto company). He's cleaned this thing up and upgraded as much as he could. It's his old computer.

Anyway, all that said, is this a good deal? Worth it?

 

Dude, it has a processor that was last in wide use early this decade. He couldn't upgrade that? That said, if you trust him, sure.

 

Yeah. For $150, why not?

 

I'd pass and get something that won't tank at any minute. But for $150, it may be worth a shot.

 

Sure.

If it crashes on you, just kill his family.

 

The thing about used laptops is, well, they're used. If you're carrying it around, it's going to get beat up. At my current stop, we cycle out our laptops after two years. If that thing has a P3 in it, it's way older than that. Plus, I can't imagine having only one USB port (mine has four and that's still not enough.) I'd say pass.

 

If all you were going to use it for were word processing, that might be a good deal. But part of the reason the computer industry developed faster processors and expanded memory was the internet became so heavily graphic intensive. Forget about watching any streaming video online with that machine. And 256 megs of ram is half the minimum recommendation to run XP, so it will likely be really slow no matter what you're doing on it.