The Death of My First "Baby"

My very first laptop died last week. It just stopped working. Motherboard problem, I supposed. It was five years and three months old, which is not bad for a generic laptop. I actually thought that it would die sooner because it was a “laptop ng bayan."

When it was six months old. My laptop was part of almost every family event, even a visit to my grandmother’s grave.

That laptop was a graduation gift from my aunt/godmother who lives in New Jersey. It was actually me who bought it using my aunt’s credit card after she made me her secondary card holder. Apparently, I am that trustworthy. :) Anyway, the laptop cost almost 40,000php. At that time, that was the cheapest laptop with good specs that I could find. Branded ones with moderate specs were selling for more than 50,000php. Gadgets were so expensive back then.

So why was it called “laptop ng bayan”? (More nonsense after the jump).

Well, in my early years in graduate school, I was one among only the few who had a laptop, so my classmates would ask me to bring it for presentations. Being a kind man, I obliged. I brought it to school almost every week (our classes were every Saturday) for three semesters.

As for me, I used it during the day to browse the net and do other wholesome stuff. Then, my brother would use it in the wee hours of the night to take advantage of ISP Bonanza’s free surfing during those hours (we were still using dial-up). Also, my sister would use it to chat with her then-boyfriend-and-now-husband living in Mississippi. The three of us siblings shared the laptop until my sister went to the U.S. and I fixed our desktop computer for my brother to use.

When I had my second, third, and fourth laptop, I loaned it to my brother, and when I had my fifth laptop, a Macbook, I sold it to my cousin. See! It’s “laspag na laspag,” so it deserves to rest in peace. My only regret is that I did not ask my cousin to pay me in full before giving it to her. My asking price was only 5,000php. She still owes me 3,000php. I can’t dare ask her for full payment now, right? *Sigh*

So what I did was salvage any part that could still be salvaged (hard drive, memory card, WIFI card, DVD drive, and keyboard). Maybe I could sell them or use them to replace my or any of my friends’ laptop parts that need to be replaced. It still gives even on its death. Whattalaptop! This is what it looked like before I threw it away:

 It actually looked worse. I removed the LCD screen after realizing that it could still be used. :)