Can I boost my R60 by adding a SATA 7200HDD?

Hello everybody!

If you've read my previous posts you'd probably know that I recently bought a SAMSUNG R60 mainly because it was very cheap. Well, I am still happy about my acquisition, however there are one or two drawbacks: The computer is slow, allright .

I've asked a week ago whether it was possible to attach a dedicated graphics card to my laptop (as I have the awful, but silent ATI X1250 integrated graphics), and as far as I understood, that was hardly possible.

So, here I come with another try, asking you whether a faster SATA 7200 rpm HDD could do the job of boosting the performance of my sluggish laptop.
Is it possible to install my Windows XP on another HDD?
If so (happily), can I find a 2.5 inch 7200 rpm HDD, so that it could fit inside the laptop case?

Thank you very much!

 

I can't think of a reason for not being able to upgrade the HDD. Komplett have a selection and cover much of Europe (go to Komplett.com and look for your country).

The easiest way to get your software onto the new HDD is to get an external SATA-USB 2.0 2.5" HDD enclosure and the trial version of True Image 11 from Acronis from which you create the bootable CD and then choose the HDD cloning option. Put the new HDD in the enclosure then run the software (it may take a few hours) then swap the HDDs. I recommend that you keep the original HDD since it is a bootable backup drive and you would need to put it back should you need warranty service.

The answer may be in another thread, but how much RAM have you now got?

john

 

I've got 768MB (if you subtract the 256 MB which go for the graphics) of RAM.
So you say I can find 7200 2.5 HDD. That is great, I'll certainly buy one.

Thanx for answering!

 

I would first upgrade the RAM. Vista will struggle with only 1GB RAM. If you add more RAM then (i) there will be less need to use the pagefile on the HDD and (ii) Vista will use spare RAM to prefetch files which it thinks you want to use. I have noticed much faster loading of my most-used programs. If your current RAM is 2 x 512MB then swapping one module for 2GB is one upgrade path (to give you 2.5GB). This Transcend module is good value or this Corsair module at Komplett. Or 2 x 1GB is slightly less expnsive but gives you less total RAM.

John

 

Ok, I got it. Actually I have WinXP installed and not Vista, so my OS doesn't exactly struggle, but it still uses the page file as you said about the same amount as the physical memory. I'll probably extend the RAM sometime in the future.
Thank you!

 

The best indicator of page file usage is a pause and a lot of HDD activity when you try to load another application or swap applications already loaded. If the computer is having to dump some RAM onto the HDD and then read something off the HDD you get a double performance hit. A faster HDD will reduce the pain but having more RAM which minimises / avoids the use of the page file is even better.

John

 

Good thinking !
Thanx again!