Most important hardware device for laptops speed?

What is the most important device for achieving a very fast PC ?

CPU clock speed?
RAM
drive ?

say getting 2GB ram with SSD disk is better than getting 4GB ram and 7200rpm disk ?

or losing few 0.xGhz infront of more ram is better?

i'm really confused, i want a very fast laptop but i dont want go to for sager as its huge for portable workstation like lenovo T series

 

Motherboard. The rest can be upgraded.

 

Its better to achieve a balance of specifications than spend too much money on one component, such as the CPU, just to have ".06 GHZ" more speed. A fast PC
these days has a mid range CPU, 2 GB of Ram (though more helps with Vista), and a 7200 RPM hard drive/5400 RPM large platter drive(like 500 mbs)/or the newer SSD flash drives. But the flash drives are very expsensive, and probably not worth it yet. O, and having a decent GPU is a must, especially if you play any games. But integrated GPU's are much better these days, so they are fine if you *dont* game.

 

Amy said it! It is about balance. While different applications may or may not stress certain components more than others. In a general sense, it would be more effective to determine the weakest component and improve that to improve system performance.

To Amy, want old avatar back. You got a special user title we got a special avatar seemed fair to me. New one is cute but in a different way.

 

pp, arent you a little old to be hitting on Amy

jk,

The most crucial part is the harddrive. 90% of the time, slowdowns are because of long boot times, or slow application launch. You can never have a fast enough mobile harddrive. However, a high density 320rpm 5400drive or a 200gb or larger 7200rpm drive will give very good performance.
Having a dual core 2Ghz processor is fine, as the cpu is rarely the bottleneck.
A good graphics card, 8600Gt or better should be considered, as integrated cards suck. The gpu is not upgradeable in 95% of notebooks, so the one you pick is the one you get.
Memory is not so important to have right off the bat, as its very cheap to get and 2-4gb is plenty for any user.

In almost all notebooks, the harddrive is the bottleneck, so the faster the harddrive, the less waiting around you do.

K-TRON

 

OK, since we are on this topic,
here is a good question.

Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T7500 ( 2.20GHz) 4M L2 Cache, 800Mhz Dual Core
or
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T8300 ( 2.40GHz) 3M L2 Cache, 800Mhz Dual Core

will be faster? Considering rest of the specs are identical.

 

The T8300 will be faster, it has a higher clock speed. The T8300 will actually also run cooler because of its 45nm process.
The T7500 does have more cache, but the core based processors really have no need for more than 2 mb of cache.
The clock speed effects performance more than the cache levels.

K-TRON

 

Yes you are correct, I did not consider it hitting on. And would like to point out we got a very cool avay. So I know you were just trying to say thanks pp. And no problem jk, glad I could help all. Amy knows from my PM's I am a creep so she will be fine.

K-T you are likely correct that HDD's are ignored the most. But you must agree no one single component is the most important. The question as asked is impossible to answer correctly.

 

i keep using the following softwares between 12-18hrs a day:
thunderbird
firefox tons of windows and tabs
kaserspy anti-virus (which i feel whats killing my processing)
openoffice
securecrt
gtalk/msn etc..

and my T42P no longer can handle the load not sure is it processor wise or ram wise or harddrive wise...

 

kaspersky has nothing to do with it. KAV is power-hungry only at full system scan. Firefox. Get more RAM.

 

no, the T7500 will run better because of its 25% increase in cache size. thats what realy matters in a CPU.... and the FSB

 

Sorry, you couldn't be more wrong. Cache makes almost no difference (<5% IIRC in the most extreme cases), compare that to the ~10% CPU clock speed difference, plus the 5-10% clock speed efficiency increase that Intel did in tweaking Penryn from Merom. Not to mention that a Penryn CPU will do it using less power draw and creating less heat. I will agree though that the FSB speed can be important, but it really only becomes so if there's so much data being transferred that the speed increase would remove the bottleneck, otherwise I would assume the performance increase would again be <5%.
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/intel/showdoc.aspx?i=3195&p=1
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Processors-Benchmarklist.2436.0.html

EDIT: Found some benchmarks on cache. The results may be a bit higher than I previously expected but the jump is also greater (1-4 in benches, 2-3 in this case). http://www.nordichardware.com/Reviews/?page=1&skrivelse=514

 

Regardless of the components, the HDD will always be the slowest part in the laptop.
I would backup all of the rest of K-Tron`s advices, there have been a number of threads about the same thing, so he`s just reciting a poem here

 

a motherboard with a faster FSB ... 667mhz is fast but if you can afford it, go with at least 800 mhz. As for RAM, it dosnt matter what brand of ram you buy they are all the same I personaly believe that 2 GIGs of ram is more than enough for anyone.
for what your just doing, 1.8 GHZ will be fine. From what you said earlier i dont assume your not gaming or doing verry little of, in this case you can go with a mid ranged video card its a good balance of power and battery life or intergrated if your not gaming at all and require hours of battery life.


and another thing ;p Avast uses less resources then KAP and its free =) its highly recomended on the forums =)

O too amy did you see the new avatar it was awesome

 

Thanks to those who replied to my question above.
Now, it looks like Vostro 1500's do not have 2.2 or 2.4.. It only comes with

T8100 (2.1GHz/800Mhz FSB/3MB cache) (+$250)
or
T9300 (2.5GHz/800Mhz FSB/6MB cache) (+$500)

I generally do not need additional .4 Ghz as I won't be doing that much processor exhausting tasks, mostly Outlook e-mails, a few picture editing resizing and occasional divx encoding, and I believe .4 upgrade is not worth additional $250. I still don't understand why Vostro 1500 does not come with 2.2 or 2.4, especially with 3GB of RAM and 128MB nVidia GPU, there isn't much left for processor to do.

What do you guys think?

 

500$ for the T9300?
Jesus, you can buy it yourself for like 350$ ...

 

Er, GPU and CPU do different things. There is plenty "left for the processor to do". RAM has very little impact on how much your proc has to do. In fact, if your main intensive tasks are encoding, a faster proc will help, far more than any GPU ever will. All the components do different things. Except for the case where some graphics functions from games etc are offloaded on to the CPU (which is both rare and bad, as it is stupidly slower than GPU), there is very little overlap in what the different components do.

 

To OP sounds like a good decision.

To eleron911 was $319 at NewEgg last week.

To OP have you looked at D830 the latitudes have good CPU costs but weak HDD's. Could upgrade HDD on your own without voiding the warranty.

 

Not that the Windows Experience Index is meaningful , but look at my specs below - the HDD is the laggard of the group. It drags that particular score down by .4. I have learned - better HDD coming up in a few months!

 

There's always a better X coming in Y. The question is if it will really be worth it. For HDD, I doubt it. Developers (of all software) know HDDs are slow, and try to optomize thier programs for minimum disk use. It is worth it to wait for Montevina, but not for some HDD improvement, imo.

 

Sure, I will tell Jesus. But honestly, you are right.. Dell does charge way too high for these processor upgrades....

 

so whats closest to SCSI disk ? SSD or 7200RPM ?

 

Neither, SCSI disks are noticeably faster than both ssd's and 7200rpm drives.
I have 4 hitachi ultrastar's which revolve at 15,000rpm. They have a small capacity, but they are extremely fast, each drive can do upwards of 250mb/sec in a hdtune test. SSD's are not at that kind of speed yet, and 7200 drives will not be there for a while. I think the fastest ssd is around 140mb/sec, and the fastest 7200 drive is around 80mb/sec.

K-TRON

 

how good wud it be if notebook sold with scsi connectors! there would be no problem because you can use sata hds using the same connector, but you'd have the option of going scsi! I suppose though it would not be really recommend as scsi disks are built for performance not for reduced heat production or battery power..... anyways there aren't any 2.5" ones

 

ROFL
Wow, I never knew SCSI disks were that fast

 

whats the SSD speed?

 

I dont know about all ssd's, but I think the fastest one is around 140-150mb/sec.
Still SSD's do not hold the reliability of enterprise 15k drives. What I mean, is that ssd's have not been tested long enough for reliability. Yeah they say they can last 1,000 yrs, but that is a total lie.
Just about every harddrive on the market is rated for over 1 million hours before failure. How can they prove that. That duration of time is over 140 years. AS we all know harddrives were invented liek 25 yrs ago.
On average typical desktop drives can las maybe 7 yrs, but usually they die within the first 4-5yrs.
I dont think any ssd will last more than 5 yrs, so I dont find it any beneficial.
SCSI drives are more expensive than desktop drives, but in terms of performance, they are king.
I wish SCSI controllers were cheaper, so I can use them in all of my machines.
SCSI has been around before IDE, so its a proven technology, and it is great SCSI 320 is the current fastest interface allowing for up to 320mb/sec.

K-TRON

 

haven't seen any laptop that SCSI disk yet...

 

Fastest hdd and fastest bus speed you can afford would be my sugestion. Those are the biggest bottlenecks.

 

If you're using it to play games, then definitely video card.

Everything else is pretty much HD.

Encoding = HD + CPU.

If you buy a laptop today with top of the line stuff without SSD, you'll still have a lot of slowdowns just because of the HD. Even a 7200rpm laptop drive does not compare to desktop 7200 rpm drives of today. Even if you had a T2xxx with 1GB ram, but had SSD it'd probably be faster overall than having faster CPU with more ram and slower hd.

Now if you have a specific goal with it, then thats where you have to purchase other parts accordingly.

 

For average use (non gaming) I would actually try to max out my battery life. If it is a plug in, then the 7200 harddrive is a must.

 

i dont game on this laptop at all

i just want to use it for business use, so far i felt that the disk the most important, so SSD is the best for laptops now

i think SSD is the way then and get 2GB ram instead of 4 since there wont me much difference overall

maybe 6MB cache processor too

 

you guys are misleading Bashar-

A: "SPEED" (the impression of a fast machine) completely depends on what applications you're going to be using!!!!

B: CPU's???? That L2 cache is BS and irrelevant for anything but CAD or 3D apps- are you a Modeller/Architect/CAD person? Do you write and compile code??? No? then SKIP THE BIG CACHE. Get the older t7200 if you're going intel- heck even a t5200 or so will be fine.

Also, do you use more than one app at once? No??? then you don't NEED a dual core. Sure, they're nice to have and modern, but most people SIDE BY SIDE COMPUTERS won't be able to tell which one HAS the dual core CPU. We all forget this sort of stuff in all the hype. It's NICE to have Dual core (SMP) rigs and notebooks, but few people will UTILIZE the REASON to have two cpu's on the same die. Of course we're going to hear otherwise, about the benefits of dual-cores, esp. from people who have bought them. I have both, and all of them, in laptops and desktops. The end all to any and all arguments FOR dual-core is simply this =multi-tasking all the time? NO??? Then dual core is not necessary. Period. However, if it comes standard, then of course it's nice to have, but don't let that keep you from an older top knotch notebook rig!!!

C: Hard drive speed. The illusion of speed in HD speed is only noticeable in startup of windows and in accessing MOVING OF LARGE files (over 500mb or more, there's a technical spec here but it is also a variable depending on what exactly you're using and how the apps/OS organize it and access it) but not videos or music files, which will play immediately off a HD regardless of spindle speed). Remember, once you install a bunch of apps and they auto-load their startup entries, this "faster booting into windows time" on the 7200 vs 5400 or EVEN a 4k drive WILL BE GONE- also unless you regularly WATCH your startups and services, and do REGULAR DEFRAG and DELETING OF TEMP files and internet browsing, this LOAD TIME will also disappear-absolutely and completely!!! The few seconds gained in a new install on either 5400vs 7200 rpm HD's will be negated with regular use by the average non-tech-savy person. So do you know and use something like Perfect Disk 8 or system internal tools and startup editing? No??? S kip the 7200 rpm drive then, no matter what you hear from my fellow geeks. IT is MORE IMPORTANT to decide if you need battery life and heat or not. 5400 rpm's is a great solution to HD access times and lack of heat. Rarely can a user notice the difference in the real world between a 7200rpm and 5400rpm, UNLESS THEY NOTICE HOW SOON THEIR BATTERY GOES FLAT on the 7200. I've pulled all my 7200's out except on a specific rig I use. This is also true about....

d: MONTOR SIZE!!! The higher the resolution, the more energy it requires to run. The top resolutions make text very clear, but small. This can't be changed if you're browsing off-HD items (I.E. Internet pages fonts will be as small as you see them, no matter how you size the laptop's display and appearance, unless you're on a non-windows platform (OS). So a nice middle ground is good for most people- but AGAIN it's about the applications you're using and how often.

IGP will be fine for you since you don't game- every single business app will run on a ATI 200m or an Intel IGP, even the older ones. They will also all play DVD's and the rest of it, and do all the rest without a hitch. Good news about IGP is that they save a HECK of a lot of battery life (often use less than 1/2 the non-IGP's use, or even less)....

So a good system for business user, who isn't in video editing or music editing or commercial work, or CAD stuff, who doesn't usually multi task (more than 1-2 programs at once) is

1.6-2.2Ghz CPU with 512kb L2
2gb ram
5400rmp HD (Whatever size you like)
middle screen resolution with nice quality screen (look at it in person)
Big battery (remember, none last forever, so 1 year average life on whatever specs are touted and then most of it's useful charge will be choked by the chemical buildup so even if it's full it can't be used/drained so will give less and less "life" unplugged-something the manufacturers "fail" to mention- hmmm, wonder why?)

Skip on the BS 7200 rpm drive, that's why they're rare in business notebooks
Skip on the dual-core unless you multi-task a lot
Skip on the latest-and-greatest CPU's unless you're into numbers and no difference in most situations or need a serious media machine (you don't)
Skip on the motherboard specs and the GPU- irrelevant in your case
Skip on everything except the nice RAM, the way it LOOKS and FEELS and that
SCREEN
and WARRANTY

You can go and old pentium M 1.7, 2gb and a nice display and invest the rest in a new battery and case and bigger HD and backup drive/solution for data security.

SSD isn't the best either- too risky for now. it's better to back up to a second drive; if you get memory errors or a short (spill coffee on a plane/office) your data is hosed possibly, though on a HD it will be fine.

and that 6mb L2 would ROCK but only if you're a CAD modeler, Graphic designer or music/video editor or something....

and one other thing, just because someone has 4000 posts doesn't mean they know what they're talking about. Just like anything, mass/quantity doesn't indicate quality. However, in a business situation for a notebook, it might pay BEST to study what the offerings are by the big distributors (Dell, HP, Etc) to see HOW they configure their business offerings, vs. consumer and game rigs, to better understand a bit which way is more important than not -though there is a TON of propaganda they propagate to sell and pay for R&D!!!!

 

P.S. the reason SCSI isn't in notebooks is the same as fast than 7200rpm drives. It CAN be done, no problem (duh) but no one who MAKES and would have to DEAL with the RETURNS in the return dept would BOTHER making such a horrible business decision, even for statistics geeks who just want the highest numbers in abstract bench marks.

WHY????

good question!!!

= The spindle speed on the platters deteriorates inversely (to the square root) with the movement of the drive itself. Do the math, but 15k rpm's is a hella lot more prone to failure and data errors or micro platter warp (so say goodbye to the graphite heads and hence the HD itself) in a laptop- so much so that no one bothers making them for consumer purchasing as only maybe one in 10k would not come back, eh? Unless it was a micro drive (under 2cm platters?). They DO exist , but not in an application/accessibility that the general public can use or has access to!!! (I.E. take a look at the tiny HD's in nanos and such- obviously it's not a matter of technical problems MAKING a tiny SCSI drive!)

Simply, they a would be/are too expensive to replace and would have absolutely NO warranty and would put the company at great risk to market to people who want to simply impress each other wish benchmarking.

Itfails on day 2? Sorry! Then guess where their company would be??? No one would buy ...etc., etc. So no one will make them.

HOW ABOUT THIS:

I nstead of faster gear, that is more prone to failure (and we've reached the max of faster/smaller almost) how about better operating systems that are more logically structured for the hard ware we are limited to in the physical world??? THAT might involve something beside money-based ethics and monopolies like Micro*coughcoughcough*Crud. But MS works, for now, and we all use it, so it's where we're at.

Now we can look ahead and see a roadmap of how the technology works, and plan a bit better. There are ways to make things appear faster, and most people will think they are faster, but it's more a matter of perspective than anything else (I.E. sleep or hibernate that notebook with a stripped down OS and no bloatware and a monitored and clean startup/services and registry tab and no anti-virus and -yes, no anti-virus, not even Avast!- and keep it OFF the net; etc. etc.... one or any or all of the above.. etc. etc... PAge file on hidden 1st partition, OS on 2nd partition, ghosts on hidden last partiton, no OS indexing or system restore, no notifying MS of errors, no auto updates or any kind of indexing by ANY apps, don't install the bloatware that comes with even the top biggest apps (I.E. Nero) use freeware and small apps (Open Office = same as MS Office) even switch to Ubuntu or is you must use MS then understand what, how, where.when.why you must over Ubuntu which was developed by smarter people for free as a testament to what CAN and COULD be done with computers.....

it's all a matter of perspective- look at the sigs on the contributors to the threads- top media machine with all the bells and whistles (I have one too) but for windows? Hmmmm..... Not to rank too much but... lol.

So don't take advice about a business rig from a gamer, eh wot????


Function and performance for exactly what we need it for, for all of us. We all have THAT in common.
That is what we ought to be doing when we give advice on here!!!!!

 

nanos use hard drives? thats a new one lol

 

The reason why SCSIs are not on notebooks is because of cost alone. SCSIs have been around for ages while sata, the last few years. There simply isn't enough reliable data to say Sata is MORE reliable than SCSI, since SATA hasn't been around for that long. If anything, High end servers all use SCSI. Not your cheapo web servers, but your SQl servers are all going to use SCSI.

Would you suggest a less standard Operating system. Possibly one where you need to take time or look for workaround to complete the same task as Windows software?

All in all, that post takes the other end of the spectrum, so I guess it was needed to balance things out.

That got me too. I just ****ed my eyebrow like Jim in "the Office."

 

Thank you very much tangograndma you have been very helpful to me!

and Thanks for everyone else who contributed in the helpful information in this thread

 

Your hard drive is the most important thing in majority of situations because it is the slowest performing component in your system. RAM is cheap, motherboard/chipsets are limited on laptops, and CPUs/GPUs are powerful enough - even if they are a few generations old.

I disagree with tango in that comparing the top end 7200 RPM drives and 5400 RPM drives that the 7200 ones put out more heat, noise, and consume more energy. In most cases they are similar so you really won't notice a loss in battery life. The biggest advantage that 7200 drives have is their access time which 5400 drives cannot touch still.

 

+1 to 7200 harddrive

 

Granny spit out a hell of a lot of common sense! I will have to re-read to truly absorb but the things I know of, spot on! Damn! No single component. It depends what you do! And granny don't pull out the wooden spoon as I do not have 4,000 posts! Go girl!


Edit: Granny just as a suggestion, consider meeting a nice man (widower) at the home. Don't beat us kids up too bad?