Slow pentium D..........

slowrunner · 12 Mar 2008 at 14:42

Not the system in my sig, but my dads rig, pent-D 661 on an intel 945gtp mobo.
He's been complaing that it's running slower than normal the past few days, so I loaded cpu-z and found that the memory is only pc2-4300 (2x256Mb).

As far as I'm aware the mobo should handle pc2-6400 shouldn't it?

Oh and does anyone know how to get rid of the bios password on that mobo? It was built by RM and was passworded at the factory....... :mad:

bledd · 12 Mar 2008 at 14:49

can he boot via cd?

if so you can remove the password using various boot cd's

slowrunner · 12 Mar 2008 at 14:51

Don't think it can....

bledd · 12 Mar 2008 at 14:57

could try removing the battery and resetting the cmos...

mattyrigby00 · 12 Mar 2008 at 16:30

find out the model number and some googling might be able to find the password (assuming its the same on all of a certain model)

Tetras · 12 Mar 2008 at 16:34

He's been complaing that it's running slower than normal the past few days, so I loaded cpu-z and found that the memory is only pc2-4300 (2x256Mb).

512MB of RAM with the price of memory now? Criminal

slowrunner · 12 Mar 2008 at 17:36

Tetras said:
512MB of RAM with the price of memory now? Criminal

Yeah it's around 18 months old now, still has another 18 months of warranty on it so he wont let me open it up :mad:

.

steve258 · 12 Mar 2008 at 17:40

Pentium D only comes with 8**/9** series so a 661 is likely a Pentium 4 3.6Ghz IIRC.

lack of ram can well be the reason why it's slow but if he doesn't want it opened then there is not much you can do apart from maybe dfrag HDD or do a complete reinstall.

Tetras · 12 Mar 2008 at 18:33

Yeah it's around 18 months old now, still has another 18 months of warranty on it so he wont let me open it up

Warranties are usually forgiving when it comes to RAM upgrades, may be worth checking the manufacturer website for an upgrade policy.

pastymuncher · 12 Mar 2008 at 19:02

If it's running slower than usual it's unlikely to be the fault of the ram. More likely that it has some spyware/malware/virus/trojan on it.

Aod · 12 Mar 2008 at 22:18

pastymuncher said:
If it's running slower than usual it's unlikely to be the fault of the ram. More likely that it has some spyware/malware/virus/trojan on it.

sorta-sorta.

with only 512MB of ram, windows really does get slower and slower the longer its used for without a good cleanout. viruses/spamware/spyware will also do this though.

i reccomend slamming 2GB of the cheapest DDR2 you can find in, and see what happens

Corasik · 13 Mar 2008 at 01:20

slowrunner said:
Yeah it's around 18 months old now, still has another 18 months of warranty on it so he wont let me open it up .

Some OEMs just love to be tight with the specs. RM's "Performance" machines still only have 1GB ram as standard, intel GMA onboard graphics and now ship with Vista!

512meg 18 months ago, thats still mean, I was running 2GB over 4 years ago, and was recommending 1GB+ to anyone who asked.

RM have had contracts with education for years, and basically are able to ship rubbish specs, in reasonably sturdy student resistant boxes and the schools just lap them up.

slowrunner · 13 Mar 2008 at 19:44

Yeah it's actully a student machine that really belongs to my sister, who got it through uni after being diagnosed with a few reading problems.

I've always said it didn't have enough RAM, but it gets a full virus scan, spyware scan and disk cleanup/defrag every week, maybe too often really.

Let dad have a go on my sig-rig, and he was shocked at how much quicker it is (omly running standard clocks), All that crappy RM really needs to give it a boost imo is an E21xx and 2 gig of ram, but he's retired and can't afford it.