More RAM or SSD?

Jordan97 · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:46

I got £200 for my birthday and I want to upgrade my laptop. Should I max out the RAM first, or go and buy a nice Vertex 3 SSD? At Christmas I will buy the other one, but which one would I see a more noticeable difference on?

I currently have 2GB single channel DDR3 which is what came in the laptop. And I also have the stock HDD, a 5400RPM 250GB.

I'm looking for speed.

chris_holmes · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:49

I would go RAM before SSD

should get both for 220 quid tho

phil128 · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:49

Waffles said:
I got £200 for my birthday and I want to upgrade my laptop. Should I max out the RAM first, or go and buy a nice Vertex 3 SSD? At Christmas I will buy the other one, but which one would I see a more noticeable difference on?

I currently have 2GB single channel DDR3 which is what came in the laptop. And I also have the stock HDD, a 5400RPM 250GB.

I'm looking for speed.

SSD!!!!

I replaced my conventional laptop hard drive with an SSD drive and the performance was bloody good. The only problem though is you don't get much storage for your money.

Get an SSD drive they're excellent.

sk82jack · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:50

Whats the speed and timings on your current RAM? Download CPU-z to find out if you don't know.

Oh and does your laptop have SATA II or SATA III connection?

chris_holmes · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:52

what size ssd u wanting

Jordan97 · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:53

sk82jack said:
Whats the timings on your current RAM? Download CPU-z to find out if you don't know. Oh and does your laptop have SATA II or SATA III connection?

PC3 - 8500, and it is SATAII, but aren't they backwards compatible?

I need at least 120GB

Moothead2 · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:57

Waffles said:
PC3 - 8500, and it is SATAII, but aren't they backwards compatible?

I need at least 120GB

The circled part is what he's after.

sk82jack · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:59

Waffles said:
PC3 - 8500, and it is SATAII, but aren't they backwards compatible?

I need at least 120GB

Yeah they are but SATA II will only transfer 375 Mb/s, where the latest SSDs have transfer rates around 500+Mb/s, so you may as well buy a Vertex 2E as your gonna get restricted if you by a Vertex 3 anyway.

Jordan97 · 21 Jun 2011 at 16:59

Oh right lol,

4.0
4
4
12

chris_holmes · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:00

OCZ Vertex 120GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-1VTX120G) £134.99

Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 PC2-6400C5 800MHz Dual Channel (KHX6400D2K2/4G) £69.98

Sub Total : £170.81
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £8.00
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £35.76
Total : £214.57

or change to the gskills ram

Jordan97 · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:00

sk82jack said:
Yeah they are but SATA II will only transfer 375 Mb/s, where the latest SSDs have transfer rates around 500+Mb/s, so you may as well buy a Vertex 2E as your gonna get restricted if you by a Vertex 3 anyway.

Ahhh, thanks for that, saved me a bit of money

Jordan97 · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:03

chris_holmes said:
OCZ Vertex 120GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-1VTX120G) £134.99

Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 PC2-6400C5 800MHz Dual Channel (KHX6400D2K2/4G) £69.98

Sub Total : £170.81
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £8.00
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £35.76
Total : £214.57

or change to the gskills ram

This is for a laptop, so that won't fit, and my laptop can take DDR3 memory.

Also, there are faster SSD's than that out there and I've got nothing else to spend the money on.

sk82jack · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:06

chris_holmes said:
OCZ Vertex 120GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-1VTX120G) £134.99

Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 PC2-6400C5 800MHz Dual Channel (KHX6400D2K2/4G) £69.98

Sub Total : £170.81
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £8.00
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £35.76
Total : £214.57

or change to the gskills ram

The RAM needs to be DDR3 and 204pin for a laptop.

They don't sell any on OcUK which match your timings, so your gonna have to go elsewhere, can't imagine they'd be too expensive though.

If you can find the same make and model that would be perfect but as long as it's the same timings and speed, they should work together.

Jordan97 · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:07

Ok, so you'd get the RAM before SSD, yes?

sk82jack · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:21

32-bit or 64-bit OS? And what are your main uses on the laptop? Can't be too memory intensive - I'd get the SSD first.

Jordan97 · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:24

It's 64-bit which is why I was wondering because I thought 64-bit was only used with more than 3GB.

I use it for web browsing, YouTube a few games here and there, the usual stuff really. I do use Photoshop frequently though.

tidusjar · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:31

A SSD would be a good choice but you can get both with that budget as previous posts proved. But more RAM will help a lot in Photoshop.

sk82jack · 21 Jun 2011 at 17:38

I'm struggling to find any 1066MHz CL4 DDR3 204-pin 2GB sticks, but have seen a set of 'Crucial 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1066MHz/PC3-8500 Laptop Memory Kit SO-DIMM CL7 1.5V' going for £30.80 from a competitor though.

Jordan97 · 21 Jun 2011 at 18:01

sk82jack said:
I'm struggling to find any 1066MHz CL4 DDR3 204-pin 2GB sticks, but have seen a set of 'Crucial 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1066MHz/PC3-8500 Laptop Memory Kit SO-DIMM CL7 1.5V' going for £30.80 from a competitor though.

I've got that sorted

I spoke to Crucial themselves and they have got an 8GB set that is faster.

sk82jack · 21 Jun 2011 at 18:05

Nice one.

As for the SSD, unless it needs to be 2.5" then I'd go for the OCZ Vertex 2E Bigfoot as it's £15 cheaper than the 2.5" version with the same speeds.