Can this laptop ever be fast??

Founder_film

Founder_film

Founder_film

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I currently have a Packard Bell laptop which used to be my girlfriends, it has a 1.4GHz Celeron M cpu and 256Mb ram. Beasically I need a PC to take back to uni so I can program (C mainly). I am a mac man but I need to design programs for windows being as its way more popular. Problem is this laptop seems to run so slow! Takes forever to boot etc etc. So would I see a big speed increase if I added an extra 512Mb of ram and re-formatted the HD with XP Pro?

My other option is to sell it and get a Mac Mini and dual boot windows on that (however I could not take this into uni like I could the laptop).

What you guys reckon? Will the RAM upgrade be worth it? Or scrap it and start again?

Thanks
 
Packard Bell's come with loads of cak installed as standard so a clean build would definitely help a lot as would RAM. I think you would find it would suffice for writing in C no probs, you certainly wouldn't be playing any games on it though.
 
Ok thanks, definately wont be playing games. I am sceptical about how big the increase in speed will be, its so frustrating working on fast computers going to a mega slow computer. Hmmmm I still dunno which way to go.
 
I have a prebuilt lappy from a well known manufacturer of a similar spec which benefited greatly from the removal of Norton Internet Security :D
 
Norton is the worst software to run on old hardware! I just hope there acquisition of sygate won’t ruin that too. :(
 
If its anyhing like Dell, then the default Windows installation will be littered with running applications and all sorts of bloat.

Upon First boot, my Dell Laptop reported a staggering 59 running processes!!:eek:

Format, fresh installation and only installating the software and drivers I needed resulted in only 22 running processes. Laptop runs like lightening now.
 
Before you do make sure you find out what hardware drivers you need by looking in the device manager etc.

I just grabbed the latest generic drivers from the relevant website (intel site for chipset and wireless) rather than the dated Dell versions.

Also, my Dell had drivers for the touch pad. It actually functioned fine without loading the drivers and resulted in one less program starting up.
 
Oh ok cool, I was going to use the Dell ones but if they are out of date then I will go straight to Intel.

So it Chipset, Graphics and Sound (Realtek I think) that I need right?
 
Thought you said it was a HP laptop?

Either way, you'll probably need:

Intel Chipset Drivers
Intel Wireless Adapter drivers (if your laptop has it)
Graphics drivers (sounds like your laptop comes with the Intel Integrated Adapter)

All of the above can be obtained from the Intel website.

Then, you'll be needing:

Sound Card Drivers
NIC card drivers (depends on the make. Windows might load a driver or you'll have to use the manufacturers)
Modem (my laptop comes with an integrated modem. Seeing as I have use for it, I've disabled it in the BIOS. One less item for the battery to power.)
MMC Drivers (it might have a memory card reader integrated in which case you'll need drivers)

As I've mentioned already, no need for touch pad drivers. My laptop has a few media hotkeys that function fine without and loaded drivers too.

Have you got a genuine Windows installation CD? If so, make sure SP2 is slip streamed into it before you do anything.

If you have a recovery CD, then you're stuffed.

The recovery CD basically contains an image of the factory default installation of when you first purchased it. This includes installing all the junk back on that you're trying to avoid!

If its not a recovery CD then the HD contains a hidden partition that contains the image.
 
Last edited:
GuruJockStrap said:
Thought you said it was a HP laptop?

Either way, you'll probably need:

Intel Chipset Drivers
Intel Wireless Adapter drivers (if your laptop has it)
Graphics drivers (sounds like your laptop comes with the Intel Integrated Adapter)

All of the above can be obtained from the Intel website.

Then, you'll be needing:

Sound Card Drivers
NIC card drivers (depends on the make. Windows might load a driver or you'll have to use the manufacturers)
Modem (my laptop comes with an integrated modem. Seeing as I have use for it, I've disabled it in the BIOS. One less item for the battery to power.)
MMC Drivers (it might have a memory card reader integrated in which case you'll need drivers)

As I've mentioned already, no need for touch pad drivers. My laptop has a few media hotkeys that function fine without and loaded drivers too.
Click to expand...

Doh its Packard Bell, dunno why I said Dell.

Ok I will try and get the Chipset, gpu and wireless from Intel.

Sound I might just get from Packard Bell. Wont bother with the internal modem (wont use it) so might disable it as you have. Not got a memory card reader. But what are NIC drivers?
 
As for my copy of Windows I have an old copy of Windows XP Pro which I bought years ago, however its not got SP1 or SP2 on it. Will that be a problem?

I think you might be right that it has a hidden partition on the HD, can I get rid of that?
 
You can download and install sp2 or download it and slipstream it with your xp cd to make a new one. :)
 
Ok I am going to intall the windows I have and put the SP on after, cant be bothered with slipsteaming a new CD.

This is a lot of bother, now I remember why I am a Mac fanboy!
 
Founder_film said:
As for my copy of Windows I have an old copy of Windows XP Pro which I bought years ago, however its not got SP1 or SP2 on it. Will that be a problem?

I think you might be right that it has a hidden partition on the HD, can I get rid of that?
Click to expand...

NIC drivers are the Network Interface Drivers for the LAN card.:)

The hidden partition can be easily deleted during the Windows setup process.
 
I recently did the same with my laptop. Clean wipe and upgrade to 512mb and it helped loads. The big increase gain is in the memory as windows xp needs about 250mb just to run so not much left for other stuff
 
Ok I wiped the HD and reinstalled windows, its already a lot faster, cheers guys.

However on bootup the boot load is shown with both Windows Pro and Home edition installations, I thought I have got rid of home, anyway I can stop this?

Going to order 512Mb of RAM hopefully see another speed boost with that.
 
i have the exact same spec on my new lappy, medion sim2000, but ive had 2 of these laptops before, all same spec, what did was to bung 1gig of decent ram into the 2 previous ones and they performed flawlessly, will be doing the same with this one once i have modified and customised the casing first :D
 
Another thing thats seems to be very annoying with this laptop is the fan noise, its stupidly loud! Surely it should not be running full wack all the time?? Do you guys reckon that its just full of dust or something? Or is there another way to get it to be quieter?
 
Founder_film said:
Ok I wiped the HD and reinstalled windows, its already a lot faster, cheers guys.

However on bootup the boot load is shown with both Windows Pro and Home edition installations, I thought I have got rid of home, anyway I can stop this?

Going to order 512Mb of RAM hopefully see another speed boost with that.
Click to expand...


Start, run, msconfig, boot.ini, check all boot paths, it will then hopefully find an invalid one and ask you to remove, apply then ok, no need to restart.

Also make sure you disable all the visual themes and everything,

Right click my computer, properties, advanced, settings under performance, adjust for best performance, also right click your desktop, properties, appearance, effects, untick the first two.

Abou the fan noise, with most laptops they run at full speed till windows loads, if you arnt usuing the chipset drivers from the laptop website it might not be able to recognise that windows has loaded, try installing the ones from the hp website.
 
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