Software: Ubuntu Helped Me Diagnose a Problem with My WIn XP Laptop

I recently have been having problems with extremely slow boot times and shut down times on my Win XP laptop. I thought it was a possible virus because of the almost community nature of the laptop while my daughter was completing a video project for school. She had a bunch of classmates over and they were transferring files back and forth.

To make a long story short, I backed up essential files and wiped the drive. Problem was still happening even after the wipe. I loaded a live CD of Ubuntu and it would not boot either. It would get stuck on an error that mentioned something about the battery. I searched the Ubuntu forums for the error and it turns out that ACPI was having problems starting because my battery is toast. Took out the battery and ran it on pure AC and the thing was as fast as ever (as can be expected from a Sempron).

Thanks Ubuntu! Windows never gave me any kind of error, at least Ubuntu pointed me in the right direction.

Fortunately the battery is not a major issue. The laptop is mainly used in one place (a desk in the living room). Never really used it for its mobility features. I will get a new battery eventually but I am in no hurry.

Batteryless old laptops make good smoothwall/m0n0wall firewall/routers...

You can get hacked bios's for mobos, what about lappies?

About the only things I can change are the date/time, boot order, BIOS/bootup password, network bootup, video display to secondary output and memory allocation to video.