dv5000 upgrade help!!!

Hey im new to this forum, and I'm in need of help on deciding how to upgrade my laptop, or to know if it's possible to. Im just wanting something that can handle games better and run a little smoother on vista.

First off, I have the dv5000 series with the turion 64 and ati 200m. And im wanting to know if i can upgrade to a better graphics card, somethink like the geForce go 7600 or ati x1700. And i want to upgrade my ram from 1gb to at least 2gb.

Next i would like to buy a new a hard drive, some where around 120 gb i think will be fine.

Thanks if anyone can help me decide if this is a good idea or if i can do so,

 

1.) You cannot upgrade your graphics card, sorry. Take a look the GPU guide for more information.
2.) More memory/a faster (or bigger) hard disk may make a noticeable improvement depending on what you're going to be doing.
3.) Look around on newegg.com for prices on RAM and a hard disk.

I think you'll have the best result grabbing some more memory--how much are you usually using? (check using task manager) and what kind of computing do you do?

 

yea i looked at that link already, and thats what i was afraid of, that i can't upgrade my card, but yea how much better would my laptop perform with more ram and a faster hardrive?

im running 1gb of ram right now, and im a casual gamer..and i just want to be able to play games like battlefield 2...and vista made my laptop a little sluggish.

im using 529 mb with just fire fox open.

also, im not sure what type of memory to get.

 

check out this link http://www.crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=Pavilion+dv5000z+Series

 

thanks for that link...oh i've got the dv5224nr if that helps, after i posted i saw that mine is just ddr ram, and if i want another gig of ram.

I did that scan thing and i now know that i just have 2 512's...so i guess im goin to have to buy 2 1gbs? well thanks for the help guys,
And what ones should i get? they are some many to choose from? im not sure what the differences are between all the choices? I want what would be the best for me, because i want use the full potential of my laptop.

and as for the hd, can anyone give me any pointers

 

ofanim -- welcome to the forum.

For the hard drive, the dv5000 series uses a standard ATA drive, not an SATA drive. A direct link to all the 120GB/5400rpm IDE notebook drives at Newegg is here. Any of those shold work. Read the reviews, and keep noise level in mind.


For the memory, you can either use the configurators at most memory manufacturer's sites, the NewEgg memory configurator, or click here for the results NewEgg's configurator brought up for your system. You'll need to buy 2 1 GB pieces to upgrade your system.

Hopefully, those links are static and they work for you. As far as the reasons to upgrade, Vista runs much better with 2 GB of RAM than with one, but it also "prefers" dual-core processors quite a bit -- so I'm not sure what to advise on that one. In any case, the extra RAM WILL make a difference -- I'm just not sure how much.

 

hey man, thanks for the help, that really helped me out big time, well i think that im just gonna get a 120gb/5400rpm WD hd, the one that was best rated on that first link, and it should just replace my old hd right? take out my old one and plug in the new one and reformat it and stuff? and as for the memory, im not sure what to look for? i was thinkin about doin the same with the harddrive and get the best rated one...

Im running the dv5224nr if that helps any

 

Well, both the Patriot and PNY 1 GB modules for $79.99 have very positive reviews from HP dv5000 series owners, and are the lowest priced. If you prefer the brand name Crucial, Kingston, and OCZ all have modules there for under $100. There's really not going to be any noticeable difference between any of the modules on that page -- they're all DDR-333, and I think they're all rated as 2.5 CAS latency, so I probably wouldn't spend the extra money on the more expensive ones -- maybe the OCZ since its only $8 more. If money is an issue, you can also just replace one module to give you 1.5 GB RAM... which in itself is a nice upgrade.

As for the hard drive, I would think that one's fine, and yes, it will need to replace your existing drive. Be sure to back up whatever you want, and since you've upgraded to Vista I would just reinstall Vista and the apps on the new drive... although if you want to try Ghost or a similar program to do a full backup/restore that might work too. (I'm not sure which of those programs plays nicely with Vista.)


Edit: Quick note. There's two VERY similar Western Digital drives on that page... the $78 one only has 2 MB cache, and the $82 one has 8 MB cache. Definitely, spend the extra 4 bucks there and get the better drive.

Anyway, hope that helps.

 

no money isn't that big of an issue, im looking to spend around 300 all together on it. about 200 on ram and 100 or so on the hardrive

well this is what im looking to get now:
2 or maybe one of these
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145068

and this
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136007
or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822146052

I kinda want the 7200rpm, but how much of a difference will it make as for load times and other stuff?

Well correct me if im wrong on any of this stuff, because i don't want to buy them and have them not fit.
Thanks for all the help guys

 

The memory is good.

As far as the hard drive, both will work... the 7200rpm drive would be faster -- how much is up for debate -- but will also be louder and produce more heat. Personally, I would go with the 5400rpm drive, for those reasons, but that's a tougher call.

 

His model might take a IDE drive but my dv5220us has an SATA drive in it. This drive is what I have.

http://www.fujitsu.com/us/services/computing/storage/hdd/mobile/mhv2120bh-sata.html

But like I said that's the model in my hp.

~kresston

 

Strange, the service manuals say that both the AMD and Intel dv5000's have ATA drives. I could have sworn that the AMD models have ATA and Intel models SATA? Hmm... yeah, looks like the HP service guide for the Intel series is wrong. The current dv6000 series is all SATA.

Anyhow, he has an AMD model so he needs ATA.

 

Hi, I have a dv5000 also and I wanted to make sure if there was any way to upgrade the graphics card? I'm not very savvy with installing/upgrading stuff either, so please excuse my dumbness. Can I take out the ATI 200m and put in a better graphics card? And if so would the computer itself support something better, like GeForce 4 or ATI Radeon 8500 series?

 

ofanim, you'll honestly get more of a performance increase by upgrading back to Windows XP. Yes I said upgrading.

Vista is horribly slow at the moment and will hold your system back more than anything else.

Your system with XP and 2GB of RAM will be much faster than it would be with Vista and 2GB of RAM and even a faster 7200RPM HDD.

 

I've seen mention of 120GB ATA drives working in the dv5000z, but never heard of a 160GB one being used in a dv5000a.

Does anyone know if this drive will work:

http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-160GB-Lapto...ryZ42184QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

It's a 160GB drive. Looks like it should work, but I'm not very knowledgeable about laptop drives and would like to verify with someone before buying it.

Thanks!

 

Yup, it'll work in your dv5000z.