Ok, I am working on a coworkers Compaq Presario CQ60 with Athlon 64x2. Motherbaord is toast, because she will power, but will not post at all. So I ordered another motherboard for it. I didn't realize that the CQ60 had both AMD & Intel versions, and when the board arrived, it was the fucking Intel board. The restocking fee to send it back is 20% ($26), plus I pay shipping, and then I have to buy another one. The guy I got this one only had the AMD board. I looked and I can get the Intel Celeron 585 2.16 Ghz processor for $13 total. But is it gonna be stupid slower than the Athlon processor? And will the computer go apeshit when I put it back together and it goes from an AMD based board to an Intel based board? Never switched one like that, so not sure which way is best. Thanks for the advice.

6/26/2010 8:54:33 AM

Generally if the computer powers on but doesn't POST I usually assume the motherboard and power supply are ok. If the motherboard is gone you won't even get power on most of the time. The fans will twitch and that's the only sign of life you will get. I would have started with swapping out the memory first if I'd been looking at this laptop (if possible).

It's going to be slower with the single core Celeron over a dual core Athlon but how much slower depends on what kind of Athlon it had to begin with.

Whether the computer goes ape shit when you put it back together or not depends on which version of Windows you have installed. In my experience XP or lower will bluescreen and require a reinstall whereas Vista or 7 will be load just fine and need new chipset drivers.

6/26/2010 1:59:50 PM

This is why I don't mess around with laptop motherboards, especially if it's someone elses

[Edited on June 26, 2010 at 2:43 PM. Reason : Best of luck to you though]

6/26/2010 2:42:45 PM

^^It doesn't even power on, really. The power light goes on, but that's it. I pulled and swapped memory sticks, verified integrity of the HDD, and plugged it into an external monitor. Nothing.

6/26/2010 4:04:11 PM

^^ ++

Ya its gonna be slower. Also second what Azaka said about it.

6/27/2010 8:09:04 PM

It comes with Vista, but I think I'm just gonna bite the bullet and go for another motherboard. Screw this swapping out processors shit.

6/27/2010 10:27:45 PM