I Restored My Laptop Computer

Tagged with cinnamon, hibernation, laptop computer, linux, raspberry pi on December 26, 2024

Back in May, I noticed the battery was bulging inside my laptop computer. A day or two later, I opened it up and removed the battery. That was a mistake. This particular model won’t even turn on without a battery in place. Loathing the idea of putting the defective battery back in, I resigned myself to using my Raspberry Pi 400 until I found something more suitable for daily use.

After searching for low-cost mini PCs, I bought one through Lazada within two weeks. It was made in China, and I expected junk. I ended up being surprised by how good it actually turned out to be. I’m still using it today, and I’ve had zero issues with it since the day I installed the Cinnamon Edition of Linux Mint on it.

Over the next few months, I searched for a replacement battery for the laptop computer, but I couldn’t find any sources in the Philippines. In September, I found and bought a compatible battery from Amazon.com, and had it shipped to one of my daughters-in-law in Washington State. She shipped a balikbayan box a few days later, which included the battery along with other things my wife, Josie, and I needed.

The Restored Laptop Computer

The cargo ship carrying our balikbayan box was routed through Taiwan and got stuck in the port for three weeks due to port congestion. It arrived in the Philippines more than 10 days ago, and the package was finally delivered to our house yesterday morning, on Christmas Day. The coincidence seemed fishy, but we received what we expected.

Josie and I started putting all the items away, and I waited for a couple of hours before deciding to work on the laptop computer. When I opened it up and installed the battery, I was amazed that I remembered how and where to plug it in. After I finished, I plugged in the power cable and turned it on, finding out the battery was already fully charged.

The next step in the process was to install the latest Cinnamon Edition on the laptop computer. There were more time-consuming steps after that, and I didn’t finish all of them until this morning.

Linux Mint, Version 22

Linux Mint, version 22.1, is currently available in beta status. Since 22 will easily upgrade to the point release, I wasn’t going to wait for it. Since my laptop computer only has eight gigabytes of memory, I increased the swap file from two gigabytes to eight. Running out of swap space isn’t a pleasant experience.

The first time I started to reboot after that, I noticed that the hibernation option was available in the shutdown menu. I didn’t install it myself, and I hadn’t been planning to install it. A short time later, I tested the hibernation option to see if it actually worked. It didn’t, even though I initially thought it did. I had the laptop computer set up to suspend when I closed the lid, and I removed the hibernate option with:

sudo systemctl mask hibernate.target

Since the laptop computer is now my main computer, I’ve been copying everything I need from the mini PC. I like the 15.6-inch display over the 14-inch display, but I don’t like the smaller keyboard. It’s going to take some time to get used to it again. When I eventually move back to the United States permanently, I plan to have a much larger display and a more powerful computer. I want to enjoy as many of my senior years as I possibly can.

Image by GatewayUSA. This article was updated on January 29, 2025.