Re: Usefulness
Since the room is kept at a constant 4º C, I'm not sure a regular laptop would withstand those temperatures for years on end as that one has.
Interesting question. In the mid-1990s, I had a Toshiba laptop suffer some hard-drive problems when it sat in a freezing office1 for a week or so. That was well below 4C, though, and it did eventually return to life once it had warmed sufficiently.
1The landlord was not particularly attentive to problems that might result from turning the heat off and leaving for an extended Christmas holiday. He had time to mull them over while replacing the bathroom plumbing in the crawlspace that January.