Reusing a Broken Laptop, Getting Comfortable with Linux, and Building My First Home Workbench
- I am not a technician.
- I am not a hardware repair expert.
- I am just someone who does not like giving up on things too easily.
This article is about an old laptop that refused to die — and maybe about me refusing to give up with it.
A Laptop That Never Fully Worked — But Never Fully Left
I bought Asus FX504GD laptop years ago, during my bachelor’s degree. It was expensive for me at the time. I didn’t buy it casually — I researched, watched reviews, compared specs, imagined what I would build, learn, and play on it.
Reality was different.
From around 2020, the problems started:
- Random Windows BSODs
- Browser crashes (especially Chromium-based)
- Screen lines, black dots, flickering
- Status access violations
- Instability that made no clear sense
I tried everything I could understand at that time:
- RAM checks
- Thermal paste replacement
- Cleaning
- Undervolting experiments (and learning when not to do them)
- Core affinity tricks in Task Manager
- Hours of reading forums, Reddit threads, manufacturer complaints
- Asking ChatGPT, reading articles, thinking deeply
Sometimes, disabling certain CPU cores would make things feel stable. Sometimes it wouldn’t.
Nothing was consistent.
At some point, I learned about VRM issues, common FX504 motherboard problems, and the uncomfortable truth:
Some problems don’t have clean fixes.
I never replaced the motherboard.
I never went for costly repairs.
Not because I didn’t care — but because I wanted to understand, or at least reuse.
This laptop sat on my shelf from time to time.
Quiet. Waiting.
I Didn’t Fix It — I Re-imagined It
In 2022, I bought a refurbished ThinkPad T490s.
Light. Stable. Linux-friendly.
I switched fully to Ubuntu — and I stayed.
But the old laptop was still there.
Every now and then, when I wanted to play GTA V (which I used to play on it), I would return.
And every time, instead of gaming, I would end up trying to fix it again.
From childhood, I’ve always been like this — trying to fix, reuse, or at least re-purpose broken things.
Even the hinge broke once.
I don’t even remember exactly how I fixed it — some bending, pulling, improvising — and finally brown packing tape. Literal plaster. It held.
Not clean.
But it worked.
If effort were commits, this laptop would have a green GitHub activity graph.
Eventually, I stopped asking:
“How do I make this laptop normal again?”
And started asking:
“What can this machine still be?”
That question changed everything.
The Decision: Make It a Workbench, Not a Laptop
Instead of fighting the screen, the GPU, Windows, browsers, and instability, I chose a different path:
- No daily desktop usage
- No expectation of perfection
- No emotional attachment to “it should work like new”
I decided to turn it into:
- A headless Ubuntu server
- A home workbench
- A network storage node
- A learning playground
This was not a grand plan.
It was curiosity plus stubbornness.
The Reality: Painful Linux Installation, One Error at a Time
Installing Ubuntu Server was not smooth.
I hit:
- Installer crashes
-
clocksource tscfreezes - ACPI issues
- NVIDIA IRQ errors
- Secure Boot conflicts
- Curtin crashes
- Read-only filesystem errors
- Broken installs that almost completed
There were moments where:
- Login passwords didn’t work
- I dropped into
initramfswith no disks detected - GRUB was my only interface
- The system booted, crashed, rebooted, looped
I didn’t solve this in one go.
I solved it by staying with the problem.
Eventually:
-
pci=reallocsolved the NVIDIA IRQ issue - Ubuntu 24.04 Server booted
- The system stayed up
- SSH worked
- The machine stopped fighting me
That moment — when I saw a clean login prompt — felt quietly huge.
What the Machine Is Now
Today, this is what that broken laptop does:
- Runs Ubuntu Server (headless) No GUI. Lid closed. Always on.
- Mounted storage A dedicated ext4 filesystem for files.
- Remote access SSH from my main Ubuntu laptop , SSH from my Android tab. File access via Samba from Android and Linux , Tailscale connectivity
- Network-first The machine exists as a node, not a screen.
From this machine:
Using this setup, I created my first image transformation script using Python, inside a virtual environment, accessed over SSH.
That moment mattered more to me than any benchmark.
I’m currently studying Data Science and Artificial Intelligence.
Seeing something I built — even small — running on my own improvised home lab felt deeply satisfying.
This wasn’t about proving skill.
It was about proving growth.
And yes — the internet helped. A lot.
That’s how learning works.
Why This Matters to Me
This project is not about showing off commands.
It’s about showing:
- Persistence
- Systems thinking
- Comfort with Linux internals
- Willingness to learn without guarantees
- Ability to re-purpose instead of discard
I am not a pro.
But I am also not seeing this world for the first time.
I like:
- Control over systems
- Understanding components
- Knowing why something fails
- Accepting imperfect solutions
This laptop is not perfect.
My setup is not perfect.
But it works — and I built it with patience.
What Comes Next
This machine can still grow:
- Lightweight AI experiments
- Background jobs
- Scheduled scripts
- More automation
- More learning
Maybe one day it will fail completely.
But until then, it’s useful.
And it earned that place.
Closing Thought
Like Japanese repair art — not hiding the cracks, but building around them.
This laptop is my version of that.
It has seen:
- My frustration
- My patience
- My refusal to quit
- My curiosity
- My limits
It’s not fixed.
It’s not reliable in the traditional sense.
It’s a patched, imperfect, working compromise.
And somehow, that makes me proud.
It’s no longer a failed laptop.
It’s a useful machine with a story.
And maybe that’s what learning really looks like.
This article isn’t about being a pro.
It’s about trying, learning, and making something work anyway.
And honestly — that’s enough.
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