SSD worth it? recommendation? for this computer

[shovenose]

It's my new take-it-everywhere laptop, an Asus X44H...
Specs:
-i3 CPU
-4GB RAM
-Intel HD3000 graphics
-320GB 5400RPM Seagate SATA 2.5" HDD

So, it takes a long time to boot up, and I'm sure it's not good for the mechanical drive that I take this on the bus...

Thing is, I need a fair amount of capacity. The 64GB drive in my Lenovo is fine since I can use an external disk at home...

So, any recommendations? And do you think it would be worth it for this computer to have an SSD?

I'm looking at http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820227777 but I'm not really sure if that's a good once, I've heard bad things about OCZ drives.
Anyway, info is appreciated

[mariushm]

Really, you're gonna use a 200$ ssd on a 400$ laptop?

Get this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820148448

Or this is you're OK with 64 GB: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820148441

These Crucial M4 , Samsung 830 and the Intel SSD are some of the best drives.

If you want the highest battery life, the Samsung 830 is to go for - it can be a difference of 10% battery between ssd drives.

[retiredcaps]

Originally Posted by shovenose

So, it takes a long time to boot up,

For all my computers now, I use hibernate instead of shutdown. It makes a difference especially on my netbook.

If you want to do a clean boot up each time and are running windows, run msconfig and check your startup items and disable all but what is necessary.

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by retiredcaps

For all my computers now, I use hibernate instead of shutdown. It makes a difference especially on my netbook.

If you want to do a clean boot up each time and are running windows, run msconfig and check your startup items and disable all but what is necessary.

I know how to optimize a computer :P See?
http://hardwareinsights.com/wp/2011/...r-pc-for-free/
But thanks anyway lol. And I hate Hibernate..


Anyway, I am leaning toward this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820148448

[Topcat]

Originally Posted by shovenose

I know how to optimize a computer

Optimized computer and windows 7....what an oxymoron that is!

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by Topcat

Optimized computer and windows 7....what an oxymoron that is!

Lol. Then maybe you can explain why my clean install of XP on a Dell 745 with a 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo CPU and 4GB RAM is so slow?

[ratdude747]

Originally Posted by shovenose

Lol. Then maybe you can explain why my clean install of XP on a Dell 745 with a 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo CPU and 4GB RAM is so slow?

Slow / Bad HDD? Check SMART.

Perhaps a bunch of dell crap in the background? How clean are we talking?

[Topcat]

Originally Posted by shovenose

Lol. Then maybe you can explain why my clean install of XP on a Dell 745 with a 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo CPU and 4GB RAM is so slow?

I have no idea, I have that IDENTICAL machine with x64 running on it, its slick as snot, I use it every day....its my shipdesk computer. HDD is a 320gb WD black. Its a very nice little rig, I have no beefs with it.....its actually gross overkill for the duties it performs.

[ratdude747]

For me, It comes down tha that w/o pirating 7 is mostly out for me... The newest I have is Vista Home premium.

I *could* get a 7 Pro upgrade copy for $20. I think I am limited to one and only one copy. However, the only computer that I have that uses Windows exclusively is non-multi-core and 32 bit (pentium M). My only other computer with windows as a boot option is my main laptop, which's Vista partition almost never sees use. It just isn't worth $20 for something I won't use.

[mariushm]

Originally Posted by shovenose

I know how to optimize a computer :P See?
http://hardwareinsights.com/wp/2011/...r-pc-for-free/
But thanks anyway lol. And I hate Hibernate..


Anyway, I am leaning toward this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820148448

The article misses the most important part of optimizing an operating system, disabling services that are not required to run.

The icon removal tip is pointless and the first tip on xp is just a trick, it basically defers some driver loading and network stuff for after user logs on - the OS will still crunch the drive for those 10s or so you feel were cut down from boot.

The Crucial M4 is a very good drive, can't go wrong with it. Be on the lookout for daily deals because there's an updated model of the M4 released and they may discount these to make room for the new ones.

[Th3_uN1Qu3]

I've stopped disabling services a couple years back, it makes less difference than you may think. Disabling animations and smooth scrolling makes the system feel snappy enough.

In Win7, i only stop completely stupid services like the windows media player network service which fills the C drive with album art whether you're using WMP or not, and annoyances like the program compatibility assistant. Disabling services is more work than it's worth, because sometime or the other a program is going to mysteriously fail to run, and you'll have to figure out which one of the disabled services it wanted running. Been thru that more than once.

[shovenose]

Well, I put a different HDD in there (Seagate 250GB SATA) and the performance is significantly better. I also installed the Chipset driver BEFORE installing Norton Business Suite this time...
Also, it looks like Win2K now because I adjusted the settings for best performance, except I did enable the show windows contents while dragging bcuz it's very useful

It's not like I needed to lower the settings, because the Radeon HD 4350 1GB can handle everything just fine, BUT it's a sort of placebo effect I think! Because the Dell literally feels 10x faster... maybe that WD HDD really was messed up!

Hey anybody want to buy a computer? it's got a 250GB WD HDD in it LOL! jk

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by mariushm

The icon removal tip is pointless and the first tip on xp is just a trick, it basically defers some driver loading and network stuff for after user logs on - the OS will still crunch the drive for those 10s or so you feel were cut down from boot.

.

Icon removal tip is NOT pointless, on lower-spec systems (pentium iii, etc.) it's actually quite useful. Try it!

The registry edit for startup makes things look faster, while they aren't. However, I wanted people to think it's faster! Besides, it doesn't harm anything...

[ratdude747]

Originally Posted by shovenose

However, I wanted people to think it's faster!

...and the truth comes out...

You know and I know that we've had the discussion about trying to use techie toys to look cool... It generally doesn't work.

Money can't buy a personality... but if you want to be cool, start there.

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by ratdude747

...and the truth comes out...

You know and I know that we've had the discussion about trying to use techie toys to look cool... It generally doesn't work.

Money can't buy a personality... but if you want to be cool, start there.

Money can buy toys that I enjoy. At least for a week
I got a lot of "nice laptop" at school today. One day of slight recognition sure is an improvement!

Now, before we get completely off topic, I'll try to get a good deal on that 128GB M4 drive and buy it.

[mariushm]

Originally Posted by shovenose

Icon removal tip is NOT pointless, on lower-spec systems (pentium iii, etc.) it's actually quite useful. Try it!

The registry edit for startup makes things look faster, while they aren't. However, I wanted people to think it's faster! Besides, it doesn't harm anything...

Removing the icons would save about 200 KB worth of memory and 1s of disk access, needed to read the 1 KB files from a single folder.
When the computer would need those KB, the icons would be paged to disk. You notice the old system runs faster without them because due to low memory, Windows probably has to read them back from the swap file.

Basically, if the system is properly optimized in the first place, the impact of reading the icons information back from swap file would be minimal.

Instead, by removing the icons from the desktop, user potentially loses much more time going through the menus (and have those icons cached and have registry accessed and several folders scanned to build the start menu)

The steps that have most impact are generally:

1. set page file to a fixed one 2-4 GB (less than 2^32 bytes is recommended)

2. clean registry if you want to, it doesn't make a damn difference to the performance. It's like having a sql database full of empty spaces after removing a bunch of records - the kernel uses binary trees and indexes to read the data.

3. disable unneeded services. Stuff like background intelligent transfer, fast search, system restore, wireless and bluetooth (if user has no wireless) are constantly monitoring and doing something and keep memory active (can't be paged) so systems with little memory are impacted by this

4. now it's time to do the defragmenting - with the page file fixed, any defragmenter worth its salt would move the page file at the beginning of the disk, therefore disk access would be miminal so you'd notice an improvement. With page file left varying, it would usually be created by the OS around the middle of the partition, so it would have room to expand.

5. tweak the startup, remove stuff that's set in autorun (java auto update , adobe acrobat fast startup etc)

6. tweak display acceleration and crap if the video card is slow. some newer cards are good enough tweaking animations and stuff won't matter, it's just visual, feels slow but the system isn't in reality

...and there's others things but really, icons on desktop... it's embarassing.

the 10s delay startup thing can cause problems for people, for example let's say a user starts a software that uses a usb dongle as protection mechanism. It's possible that driver didn't load yet, so the software invalidates the license...it's unnecessary. If you disable the services you don't need, then the system would boot up fast anyway.

(apologies for being off topic)

[lti]

How long does this computer take to boot up?

Originally Posted by mariushm

2. clean registry if you want to, it doesn't make a damn difference to the performance. It's like having a sql database full of empty spaces after removing a bunch of records - the kernel uses binary trees and indexes to read the data.

In my experience, cleaning the registry can also break installed software and will eventually corrupt the registry, forcing the user to reinstall Windows.

[shovenose]

Originally Posted by lti

How long does this computer take to boot up?

In my experience, cleaning the registry can also break installed software and will eventually corrupt the registry, forcing the user to reinstall Windows.

Which computer?
The XP Dell or the Asus X44H?

[c_hegge]

Originally Posted by mariushm

4. now it's time to do the defragmenting - with the page file fixed, any defragmenter worth its salt would move the page file at the beginning of the disk, therefore disk access would be miminal so you'd notice an improvement. With page file left varying, it would usually be created by the OS around the middle of the partition, so it would have room to expand.

I never defragment. It makes no difference to the performance and wears out the HDD. I do agree with you though on removing icons. I don't think it ever has made a difference and don't think it ever will.

@shovenose: I would say unless you can find a cheap SSD, forget it. It's not worth it on a cheap laptop.

[ratdude747]

Originally Posted by c_hegge

I never defragment. It makes no difference to the performance and wears out the HDD. I do agree with you though on removing icons. I don't think it ever has made a difference and don't think it ever will.

I disagree. On units with a 5400RPM or slower HDD, it DOES make a difference when fragmentation is severe. My Dell Latitude D400 once was crippled by this; a defrag (using the auslogics utility) had a large impact.