M15x upgrade questions

I am planning on upgrading the M15X for my mom to use (Mainly multimedia, word processing, sometimes Photoshop as well). Currently it has the original i7-720qm, HD5850 with 6gb of ram. It is super slow right now, booting takes a minute or so (stuck on the Alien head upon pressing the bower button for 20 seconds or so), 1080p on youtube is not watchable. I am planning on getting a 920xm with some moderate overclocking. Does the processor support 16gb of ram? It says 8gb of ram support on intel product page. I am not sure what video card to choose though. I do have a 180w power block lying around if it is required.

 

before you spend anything, i would repaste the cpu and clean the heatsinks. Do the same for the gpu. Also clean out the fans to remove any dust. Sounds to me like your system might be throttling as that config should be absolutely fine for 1080p youtube videos.

First upgrade I would get would be an ssd over the 920xm.

 

Minor things add up.
If you are intent on buying "something," the SSD is the first thing. 8G RAM is more than adequate.
But I would start with
-Malwarebytes
-Disk cleanup / Defrag
-Ccleaner
-UPDATE DRIVERS!
-Update bios (if your comfortable)
-etc.etc.etc.

 

To start with back up anything you want and run Alienware Respawn. Use it to do a factory reset. It'll speed up your machine without an SSD and you'll have a clean install to transfer over to an SSD when you get one.

 

A believe that putting in a SSD and reinstalling Windows should get rid of all the issues.

 

My hard drive was set to be in ATA mode, switching to AHCI seems to fix the booting time issue (It appears I might have to change the registry for this to work, haven't had much time this past few days, will try it this weekend). As I was trying to reinstall the OS, I found that the DVD-ROM no longer works (It is not recognized in the Bios or Device Manager, and now my OS disk won't come out). So I may have to tear it apart and replace it or find a spare USB to install the OS or just leave the system as is and do some cleanup on the current OS. I am not going back home until Christmas this year (Damn Canadian university with its 3 semesters!) so I should have some time to do all this. SSD may be a solid option, I probably will swap the 256 I have in my 17 when I buy the 1tb drives.

 

I'm telling ya... Just use AlienRespawn to revert back to the factory state. Assuming your m15x is post Sept 2009. No disk required.

 

920xm is a good investment actually. Especially if you plan to game. Although you should also look to upgrade the GPU then as well. Plenty of options in that department too over the ancient 5850M.

16GB of ram does work in the M15x. 2x8GB sticks. Windows will recognise it no problem although the M15x bios won't report the ram properly in the bios. Other than that 16GB runs as it should. Unless you plan to run CAD or do some heavy photoshopping etc I don't see how you will need more than 8GB. I have never used up all 8GB of ram and I don't do those jobs on my machine.