How to upgrade a Dell Latitude CPX - Intel P3 500-650 laptop

only dell can help with bios passwords

Do you have an Internet provider? Cable / DSL / Dial-up? If not, the you can contact your phone or cable company and they will tell you what plans they have available and the tech will set your laptop up for you.

Yes call Fries Electronics let them know what model laptop you have they can tell you the type of memory you need SoDimm more then likely, they will give you a price. It is better to remove the old memory and take it with you when you go to buy it has to match. Also you can ask what is the largest recommended hard drive they have for this model laptop, probably 60gb. The motherboard for that laptop does have limitations. That laptop probably does not have a built in wireless card so you can either use a hard wire RJ45 Data cable and plug the other end into your Internet Router, or you can purchase a PCMCIA Wireless Card to insert into the slot on the side of the laptop. This PCMCIA Card will allow you to access the internet wirelessly. You have now beefed up your CPx Latitude.

You can put xp on with no problems - i'm writing this on a cpx with just 128mb RAM and XP. But when you try to use any anti virus you may find it runs very slowly. I'd recommend getting xp and maybe trying a processor friendly anti virus like AVG if you're planning to go online a lot. Hope this helps.

Go to www.support.dell.com and download the drivers there, you can select the model or enter the TAG number which is on the bootm of the laptop labeles as Service Tag

If the laptop is in warranty, then dell will take care of it. Also, are the two ram sticks the same speed? mixing ram can be bad. also, goldmemory software is excellent for ram testing.
lastly, if there is a bios version that allows you to use both ram slots, use that bios. a newer bios is not always better.

you can use 2x128mb or to flash the bios with new version..

I have a CPX H500GT. To get it to run XP Pro to run right, max out the ram. And get a larger harddrive. Xp uses a substantial amount of space.

Yes, No problems as I put a 100GB drive in the LS model micro Latitude!

May be your system is not supporting usb 2.0.That's way your dvd writer is not functioing at higer speed.To get the advantage of latest technology like this,ultimately u need the latest motherboard .Instead of upgrading your hard drive,Ram and other compnents u should have gone for a new laptop .Cost wise also u could have got full satisfection.