to stop the over heating get a fan to blow straight on it,i have even seen the casing on desktops taken off blowing directly on the pc.
my wife as a older laptop and gave it to her mom without any problems!
the only trouble you will have is getting them to know what there doing with it,so a laptop with it all built in will cut out and problems.
why not try getting a reconditioned one sent to them and see how it goes?
