ZT3000 Processor support

Currently you can get this loptop with 5 options
Intel(R) Celeron(R) M 1.2 GHz
Intel(R) Pentium(R) M 1.4 GHz
Intel(R) Pentium(R) M 1.5 GHz
Intel(R) Pentium(R) M 1.6 GHz
Intel(R) Pentium(R) M 1.7 GHz
If I opt for the slow celeron can I upgrade to 1.7 centrino or what ever lies ahead in the future. I am not sure if the speed of the memory that will be shipped will be the same for the celeron or the 1.7 centrino. Would the motherboard be the same between the above processors?

 

Joe,

I believe the systemboard used in this model is all the same. The CPU should be in a socket(479pin), but the Pentium-M's also have a surface mounted model which is not swappable. I guess is mainly depends on what HP has at the moment at the time of manufacturing. It would probably be better if you went with the 1.7 Centrino because it may be difficult to get one of these CPU's, and even if you did, I'm pretty sure they're probably gonna be expensive. Also, by the time you're gonna want to upgrade, you're probably gonna want to get a different computer...something that's smaller, lighter, faster & newer.

-Vb-

Oops...Booleg2go just beat me to the punch. [ ]

 

I'm sure that the pentium M CPUs would all be interchangeable, I'm not sure if you got the celeron that you could upgrade to the pentium M though. You would have to see if the CPU is user accessible in the HP notebooks, some may even solder them in as far as I know. The motherbaords are most likely the same, but the BIOS may differ. In the end, it probably won't be worth the hassle; by the time the 1.7Ghz comes down in price far enough to make it worth it for the minimal increase from a 1.4 or 1.5Ghz you will probably just want a whole new notebook with all the bells and whistles the future holds at a fraction of the cost of todays notebooks.

Jack

 

I agree with Veonmbite to some degree, with the laptop don't get it planning too much on upgrading the cpu down the road, the cost of this will most likely not make it worth the performance gain. I would say just go with what you think you will need for the next couple of years, just don't get the celeron. It can't even compete with a mobile pentium at 1.2ghz let alone the Centrino chips, which are clocked lower, but have a 1mb L2 cache and some other nice features to make them able to compete with 2.x P4s at least somewhat decently.

zx5000 :: 2.4M :: 512 DDR :: 40gb 4200 RPM HD :: 15.4" :: Radeon 9600 Mobilty M10 :: Aquamark3 21,862

 

I think I am going to get the ZT3000 with 1.5ghz proc and 1GBRAM and a 5400RPM HD.
I think there might be dimishing returns from the faster 1.7 proc(guess). I know that a 5400RPM HD is important along with keeping running apps in memory.
My (guess) is that a 400MHZ bus along with 5400RPM HD would be sufficient to keep the 1.5 proc busy but the faster 1.7 might be waiting for I/O. Seen any articles on this?

Heres TOM'S H/W on the notebook performance at various HD RPM's
http://www.tomshardware.com/mobile/20031031/index.html

Checked newegg they have a 1.6M for 299.00. So it doesn't make sense to buy the slower processor and upgrade for a while.

 

If someone could post processor usage(from task manager or whatever) with some app usage from a x1000 or a zt3000 that could help and would be appreciated.

 

Unless you need it for multimedia, you'll be more than fine with the specs you identified. I have a PM 1.0 with 1GB RAM and it runs like a champ.

Editor in Chief http://www.bargainPDA.com and http://www.SPOTstop.com

 

Will you be planning to play any games with this unit? If so, games like Rainbow Six 3:Ravenshield played a bit sluggish on an HP NX7000 Pentium-M 1.6Ghz CPU at the higher settings. If you plan on playing any of the new games that require higher minimum requirements, I would recommend a higher powered CPU, IMO. The NX7000 is the identical unit to the ZT3000, but the CPU was a 1.6 & was branded with the HP Compaq name rather then HP Pavillion.

 

I will use it 3% for games. I need the portability 24 x 7(work), otherwise I would go with a ZD7000. This laptop would be perfect except for the 9200 video. I am a fan of Unreal 2004, Halflife, Rise of Nations and Homeworld. Luckily I have a system at home for games.

So a 1.6 might help alleviate processing from the graphics card? I could go to a 1.6, a 1.7 would hurt the wallet to much.

My apps will be (IM, VBasic tools, JAVA apps, email, WEB browsers(mozilla and IE), Visio and MS Project) I would like to have 3 or 4 of them all running at the same time.

 

The processor upgrade wont really help out gaming much. The more important factor is graphics and memory. If these are good a slight boost in the cpu will not noticeably affect your gaming.

zx5000 :: 2.4M :: 512 DDR :: 40gb 4200 RPM HD :: 15.4" :: Radeon 9600 Mobilty M10 :: Aquamark3 21,862