We bought a laptop off someone used for 50$. It was shit but we wiped it and put Linux mint on it. It runs better then it did previously. However it still can't do a whole lot at a time.
But something like that might work for you.
this post was submitted on 21 May 2026
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askchapo
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A single BSOD does not necessarily mean it's busted, it could very well just be a memory error that triggered it for example, if it keeps happening then it's an issue. Noting down the error code comrades already told you about is the best way to be sure the next if it keeps happening.
It could also go away if you format it. Since you use it just for browsing, retro gaming and old pc games you could also try Linux if it keeps giving you trouble on Windows, mainly because something that triggers a BSOD on Windows might not be an issue on Linux, there are light weight Linux distros you can use if you laptop is really old.
my rec for under 100$ is don't. it doesn't matter how light your use case is, you're just gonna get crap that will die in one year, if it doesn't make you punch it yourself before that. get a barely used old thinkpad if you find one and put linux on it. in general if a laptop's target demo is businesses it'll be a great find on second hand markets because a company has probably bought them en masse and then dumped them due to debt/downsizing and most of them will be healthy. do not get chrome books if it's garbage for elementary schoolkids it'll be garbage for you.
if you just don't have the budget for a new laptop and if your current laptop can be upgraded, put a SSD in it, it's the best way to revive an old laptop. although with the current prices i'm not sure if you can do that under 100$ either.
I bet if you ask on facebook marketplace, lots of people have an old SSD just laying around.
i would recommend against buying second hand SSDs, it's just a scam waiting to happen. you can easily set the device health to 100% even though it's completely used. in the best case you can't use most of its pages and in the worst case it corrupts your data silently. you are far far more likely to see a scam listing than someone that bought a SSD and forgot or couldn't return it. SSD is a wear part, a good SSD (whether brand new or opened) is an unused one, and those are just not common. you are not paying 50% of the price for 50% of the performance, you're paying 50% of the price for violent failure do not fall into this trap.
Imo the only thing worse then buying a used SSD is buying a used hard drive.
Made that mistake a few years ago. Damn thing slowly corrupts stuff. 0/10 would not recommend.
No one makes fake hard drives that report fake capacities though. At most in that market they might reset the SMART data to hide how long it has been on. There is a huge market for fake name brand SSDs that are just SD cards 1/10th the stated capacity and tons of flippers and other scammer assholes who sell them in convincing looking packaging.
I meant beg for a free one lol, I'm assuming 60GB to 128GB is pretty achievable for sub $10.
where i am it is absolutely not but also i am not living in the best of places. with the current AI crisis for i would wager that for 128GB anything below 30$ is a scam but your mileage may vary. begging works but it's really time inefficient too and the results are not that great. begging for money is probably better than begging for parts.
There are no worthwhile laptops under $100, don't waste your money on something that won't work.
Not even the 70 or 80 dollar thinkpads I see on ebay?
At that price you can probably get a brand new 512GB SSD (might be hard to determine which connector to buy tho)
I understand I’m doing the “lol just have more money” bit, however you will go through 3-4 of those $100 laptops when you could have just got a MacBook neo or something and had a vastly superior experience for the same cost
Those should start popping up in secondary markets soon for reasonable prices
Just install 
I know its a joke, but they don't really seem to understand much about PCs
Thats like asking someone why your car is running badly just for them to start rambling about you not pretiming your camshaft so you can get extra performance
I think you're underestimating modern Linux - Mint is particularly good at it, but a lot of distros have become very simple and user friendly to install. Installing mint to keep a shittop running is exactly what one of my least tech literate friends did, and when I tried similar I was really surprised at how easy they make it.
At worst they can probably find some kind of Linux coop near them that would be happy to install it for them.
Sorry, who's who in this analogy?
It can be a glib response but I've had old shitty laptops run Windows terribly, and then after installing Linux Mint have them run way better afterwards. I certainly think it's a worthwhile troubleshooting step, unless a hardware problem is indicated by the specific error message
They may not be computer savvy, but I kinda think it's like the bell curve meme, there is a level below which you won't even notice differences.
Game emulators and PC gaming might not make Linux the best choice but it depends on the programs and if a simple compatibility layer can be installed to bridge the gap.
All I do on this is web browsing and retro gaming with emulators and old pc games.
do what tech people do when they have car trouble. ask a car person to install the camshaft pretimer for you.
Yes, but thats a different topic entirely
„Bsod by hardware gore” cant be 100% fixed by Linux. It turns out, its a faulty HDD, and Linux would not have done anything
ok but if you have a tech friend they might offer to upgrade your RAM and give you a new hard drive. I knew several guys who did upgrades and just had boxes of parts that weren't valuable enough to sell on ebay.
Yes, but now we arrived back at Helping instead of just yelling switch to linux
The BSOD might be hardware related, in which case no amount of software will fix the problem.
Personally if I was them I'd start diagnosing stuff, but that does take skill.
Not sure if you can get there for $100 but used Thinkpad might be a good way to go
Used thinkpad gang
Drop 32 gb of ram and an M.2 in that bad boy and you've got a ripping fast machine for pennies on the dollar
The lifetime per dollar you can get out of a mildly upgraded refurb thinkpad running Linux really is incredible.
My daily driver laptop was built in 2012. Replaced HDD with SSD, upgraded RAM (initially to 8 gb, now to 16), completely usable for everything except gaming and local "AI". It's started to slow down because the heat sink needs repasted and it thermal throttles, but that's doable.
Hell yeah. I’ve had a t420 for about forever, SSD+16gb upgrades, plus I put an i7 in there. Still kicking along. It couldn’t run win10 for shit… flawless with a lightweight Linux distro though :)
I was too broke to do the screen upgrades when pets were more available for doing that. Now if only I could get an OEM battery…
Mine is an X230, with the tradeoffs that entails, but I've been happy with it. Not even using an especially lightweight Linux on it. It's running Fedora, and even Gnome runs fine on it, though I prefer Niri.
Noted ty
what's the bsod code text thing? ive seen many old laptops can be fixed with a cheap ssd
Didn't catch it
If it happens again, jot down the number and post it here!
K will do
Yes please do. It will give us a good idea of what is likely wrong. It could be you just need to reinstall the OS, it could be hardware failure that can be fixed with a $50 part (it could even be just overheating and a canned air duster and some new thermal paste for $17 together would fix it), it could be the whole thing is toast.
If you can try to snap a photo of it rather than trying to write it down manually as they restart so fast these days it's hard to see them. You can still find the error code in the event logs but if you're not a computer person that could be a tall ask so the photo would be best and then type it out here.
If it ends up being washed PM me. I can dust off one of the recyclers at mt work and give it to you instead (as long as you are in the US, and sorry if you are too)
A BSOD says nothing about a computers physical health. That being said, if your PC is still good don't change it
My laptop is quite old and I still have a busted hdd that's super slow and always running at 100%
Can you swap it for an SSD?
Dunno offhand
If it's really old and uses an magnetic 'spinning rust' style hard drive it probably doesn't have an m2 slot connector so you'd want a "SATA ssd" as opposed to a newer "m2" style. For $100 or less you can get up to 500GB size as long as you stick to the less prestige brands. 256gb is another option though you only save about $20-$30.
Don't buy anything yet until you can get someone here to look at that error code and make a diagnosis as you don't want to spend good money after bad on something that might not fix the problem.
Chromebook with Linux installed (use the xfce desktop for performance reasons) is the most cost effective solution IMO. Chromebooks often require you to open it up and remove a physical screw to unlock the bootloader and install a new OS.