Got one of these...

[stevo1210]

Um... got a bit carried away on eBay and got this device for about half of what it retails for at other classifieds.



So... it's a Sony Vaio UX17GP and I thought it was a cool gadget to have, can't wait to see the looks of peoples faces when I pull it out for use LOL.

I'm going to keep it stock XP because Vista is rubbish and running on 512MB of RAM, it wouldn't be a great idea for Vista anyway.

So I wanted to ask, with XP... should I get an nlited version or use the full XP version? Trying to get as much speed as I can out of 512MB of RAM and a 1.2GHz CPU. Will upgrading the HDD to SSD change any speed factors?

Thanks.

[ratdude747]

Re: Got one of these...

nlite it... unsure of what psrts to chop though

SSDd will br faster but also will KILL your battery life... good ones actually use more power than HDDs in the long run

[stevo1210]

Re: Got one of these...

I thought SSD's use less power because they don't have moving parts?

[ThePCDoctor]

Re: Got one of these...

All those memory chips use POWER, constantly.

Much more than a small HD that is powered down to save power.

That looks like a tablet PC, Right?

Did it not come with XP already installed?

I have an Acer Aspire ONE netbook that came with XP-Home and it's pretty peppy with 1.5 gig of ram.
You don't have to nlite your OS. just limit what runs.
When ever I set up a Netbook or Laptop, I shut down at least 24 services that would otherwise run in the background all the time, then I go into MSCONFIG>Startup and shut down everything that's not 100% needed to be run all the time. That takes a huge load off of the CPU and decreases both heat and battery drain.
A good reference for what services can be shut down, or just put into Manual mode, is the "Black Viper" web site.

The Doctor

[stevo1210]

Re: Got one of these...

I wouldn't call it a tablet PC, but it does have a capacitive touch screen, a keyboard and a mouse... I think it's technically a UMPC.

Anyway, it comes with XP Home edition installed... but on 512MB of RAM it runs okay, though if it runs a bit faster I'd be happier

[Topcat]

Re: Got one of these...

I've never seen anything like that.....interesting and very cool. I'd throw some more RAM in it if its possible though....

[ratdude747]

Re: Got one of these...

I've never seen anything like that.....interesting and very cool. I'd throw some more RAM in it if its possible though....

you would have to solder in new chips and possibly swap the memoiry controller and hack the BIOS.

My suggestion is to try win2k on it...

[stevo1210]

Re: Got one of these...

I've never seen anything like that.....interesting and very cool. I'd throw some more RAM in it if its possible though....

I only knew that such a nifty device existed after watching James Bond (Quantum of Solace) on DVD a few weeks ago...

Take a quick look here at the movies it's been in! http://www.umpcportal.com/2009/07/so...elebrity-umpc/

Anyway, the maximum RAM is 1GB but it's soldered in. However, some experts have soldered 1GB chips in and it works great... I'm getting too old to solder ... so I'll live with 512MB of RAM and maximize what I can

[mattch]

Re: Got one of these...

maybe linux will run a bit faster than windows, otherwise i second ratdude, win2k,

install a sega emulator and play mortal combat or sonic.

[momaka]

Re: Got one of these...

nLite not needed. XP should run great with 512 MB of RAM, as long as you:
1) Don't install an anti-virus and firewall (use Windows firewall).

2) Turn OFF Automatic Updates (they really are a major resource hog).

3) Turn OFF/disable pretty much all visual effects (the only ones you can leave without impact on system performance are: Smooth-scroll list boxes, Use background image for each folder type, Use common tasks in folders, Use drop shadows for icon labels on the desktop). If Windows Classic interface doesn't bother you, use that as well (note: you can change the color of just about every item on the Windows Classic interface, so it can still look pretty good IMO).

4) Turn OFF all other program updates and unnecessary processes such as Java (jqs.exe, javaw.exe), Adobe (readersl.exe and adobearm.exe), Google Update (gupdate.exe and a few others) and other useless ones. If you're not printing, turn off the spooler service (spoolsv.exe). Finally, also turn OFF indexing service, error reporting service, and help and support. I even turn off System Restore on some on my non-critical computers.
A minimal but still fully-functional Windows XP install can be reduced down to 20 processes +/- 5, depending on hardware drivers.

5) Avoid websites with lots of Flash content (then again, with a 1.2 GHz processor, you will want to avoid Flash-heavy websites. The occasional YouTube would be okay, but don't try more than 5 windows open at the same time).

By the way, that's a very cool gadget.

[lti]

Re: Got one of these...

I see a few points that I don't agree with in the previous posts.

Any decent antivirus software will run on this particular computer. Even Norton will run on such an old computer with only a slight performance drop.

Automatic updates are not that much of a resource hog. With this computer, the only effect will be high CPU usage (around 75%) for a few seconds.

I don't see how the visual effects and the default interface in Windows XP will decrease performance at all, even on a computer that matches the minimum requirements for Windows XP (a 233MHz processor and 64MB of RAM).

Java does not even need to be installed. Windows has built-in JavaScript capability that is good enough for 99% of applications and Web pages that require Java. There isn't any essential Google software either. All of the "unnecessary" services take up only a few megabytes of RAM and no CPU resources (1% CPU usage at the most).

The only Flash elements that can run on such an old computer are online music players. Even a modern computer will not be able to handle five Flash-heavy Web sites at the same time.

I used to run XP SP3 on a computer with 256MB of RAM, and my parents' computer used to have 512MB of RAM. If those "enhancements" actually helped, I would have kept all of that stuff disabled. I only upgraded the RAM in my parents' computer so they could get more malware on it before it became so slow that I would have to reinstall Windows. I got tired of reinstalling Windows every few months.

Is everyone trying to run Windows XP SP3 on a computer with an original Pentium processor (not even a Pentium MMX) and 64MB of RAM?

At least nobody is saying that running registry cleaners daily and keeping all drivers updated to the latest versions will improve performance.

[momaka]

Re: Got one of these...

Any decent antivirus software will run on this particular computer. Even Norton will run on such an old computer with only a slight performance drop.

Wrong.
All AV programs will hurt your hard drive's performance quite a bit - some more than others. The situation is severely worsened if you try to open a folder containing many exe files.

Automatic updates are not that much of a resource hog. With this computer, the only effect will be high CPU usage (around 75%) for a few seconds.

Again, very wrong.
AU can slow down even fairly modern computers (and by that I mean dual cores) to a halt. Just put a computer on a very slow connection, let it sit turned off for a few days, then try to see what happens when Windows starts and AU tries to update. I've seen this a million times at work and on friend's computers.

I don't see how the visual effects and the default interface in Windows XP will decrease performance at all, even on a computer that matches the minimum requirements for Windows XP (a 233MHz processor and 64MB of RAM).

Here's a little experiment for you:
Go on a Pentium 4 or older PC with Windows XP (with visual effects and XP default interface) and open Task Manager. Now open an explorer window (or Firefox, or any other program that isn't CPU intensive). Begin minimizing and maximizing the program from the task bar and observe the CPU usage on Task Manager's mini window in the system tray and tell me what you see.

Now disable visual effects and enable Windows classic interface, then repeat the above experiment.

Anything obvious?

Java does not even need to be installed. Windows has built-in JavaScript capability that is good enough for 99% of applications and Web pages that require Java. There isn't any essential Google software either. All of the "unnecessary" services take up only a few megabytes of RAM and no CPU resources (1% CPU usage at the most).

Some parts of my uni's website require Java. There are also quite a few online apps that require Java. While I agree that it's not absolutely necessary, it's good to have it just in case.
Yes, Google software is not essential, but for those who prefer Google Chrome (not me), Google Update is automatically installed with it - and that thing contributes to the useless services at start-up.

Also, most of these services don't just take "a few megabytes of RAM", they take a lot more. IIRC, javaw.exe takes 20-30 MB, jqs.exe ~5 MB, readersl.exe ~20 MB as well, adobearm.exe ~3 MB, spoolsv.exe ~2 MB... If you keep adding it like that it easily goes over 50 MB - and that's only a handful of processes. With AV, add another 50-100 MB or even more depending on how bloated the AV software is. I regularly find at least about 100 MB of wasted RAM for average Joe users - that's 100 MB loaded every time the computer starts. Not to mention that the data for these processes is not even read consecutively. And by the way, all of this above is when I'm servicing 32-bit XP. With 64-bit Vista/7, the RAM usage is even higher.

Just because a process doesn't take a lot of RAM or CPU cycles doesn't make it insignificant. It all adds up and you get a slow POS computer in the end if you don't take care.

The only Flash elements that can run on such an old computer are online music players. Even a modern computer will not be able to handle five Flash-heavy Web sites at the same time.

Not true. Anything with a 1 GHz processor or higher will run basic 360p flash video.

I never said you can run 5 Flash-heavy websites at the same. Just said that if you have more than 5 windows/tabs with heavy Flash websites loaded on a computer with that little RAM, you would get a problem. Flash is both RAM and CPU hungry nowadays.

[Scenic]

Re: Got one of these...

Java does not even need to be installed. Windows has built-in JavaScript capability that is good enough for 99% of applications and Web pages that require Java.

Java has absolutely nothing to do with Javascript, apart from containing the word "Java". Do your homework please.

@stevo1210: If you want, I could give you a link to a "perfectly" nLited version of XP Pro SP3. The ISO is 100MB in size, and the fully installed windows uses about 200-250MB HDD space and ~40MB RAM total.
I've been using that on a PIII 750MHz laptop with 256MB SD-RAM and it's ridiculously fast. The only thing that chokes it down is web browsing (due to lack of RAM and bloated websites everywhere)

If you wanna play around with it, just shoot me a PM

edit2: this VAIO UMPC thing seems to be fairly modern too. CPU is a Intel Core Solo U1400 1.2GHz (5.5 Watt), uses DDR2 RAM, has Wifi, bluetooth, a fingerprint sensor and a webcam built in.