Upgrade my CF-30

Just got a newer CF-30 (not sure which generation, but I think it's only a few months old) and was wondering what you all thought about upgrades.

Currently, it has 2GB of RAM and is running XP Pro. Obviously, it has the SL9300 processor.

Unfortunately, it runs TERRIBLY slow, barely doing what I need for work and taking a TON of time to do it.

I ran Geekbench to get a baseline number, and it returned a score of 1820. For comparison, my Dell Studio XPS-16 (I7-Q720 processor w/ 8GB of RAM) scored a 4669 (in 32bit mode).

So my standard questions are this:

Anyone running 4GB of RAM? I know there is a bottleneck there. What brand are you guys using?

Anyone replace the SL9300 with something like the 9600?

The rugged features of the laptop DEFINITELY get used, and it was purchased before the CF31 was available. Currently the computer just isn't up to the tasks at hand, and I would like to solve that.

Any help would be great!

 

See CF-30 Differences Between Marks.

 

Good. So mine is a Mark 3 since it has the (S)L9300 processor.

 

Welcome to the forum!

The Toughbooks are made for durability and to survive disasters that would break any other laptop... Not for speed... With that said... It should be running THAT slow.

I would look into disabling services that you don't use. Upping the RAM wont help much with XP as XP maxes out at about 2 GB of RAM that it utilizes anyway... So 4 GB won't help much. You may look at your specks and see f you have a 5400rpm drive... If you do... Switch to a 7200RPM drive.... That will speed you up by 25%!

Or you can load Windows 7 AND upgrade the RAM to 4GB and really get a speed boost. There was also a thread about ReadyBoost you can check into.

You cannot change the processor on the Toughbook... It is soldered to the motherboard.

 

Thanks Toughbook!

I'll look into the hard-drive swap. Would an SSD be a better option? Probably not, since a lot of what we do is storage intensive.

My company is a bit against Windows 7, but I'll see if I can put some swing into it. Maybe it would be better if it was a Win7/4GB/SSD or 7.2k hard drive setup.

Good to know about the processor also. I figured it might be socketed, like the one in my Dell is. I'm not interested in de-soldering a processor for a marginal upgrade.

Has anyone successfully overclocked a CF30?

 

You DO NOT want to overclock a unit with no fan! That is the FIRST RULE!

These aren't Dulls.....

 

The Win7 upgrade is great. I'm running it on my CF-29 MK4 with 2GB RAM and 4GB ReadyBoost it made a big difference. (click on "ReadyBoost" in my sig for more info).
If you go SSD then forget about the ReadyBoost as it's not needed.

Now note a big difference on a Toughbook is still slow by modern notebook standards. Think of these more as a ruggedized large netbook and you'll have a better idea of what they are. They are truly a different animal and comparing them to other notebooks is comparing apples to oranges.

And like TB said no overclocking. The CF-30 is pretty much at the limit of what can be done with passive cooling.

 

If you have the factory discs, I'd wipe it and reload clean - they are not rockets, but are pretty fast, especially under XP. Remember to not have a lot of background stuff running - the simpler the faster.

 

When I upgraded our 3.4GHz XP Media Center Edition (same as XP Pro) desktop from 2Gb to 4Gb there was a definite performance increase.

 

Running XP Pro in my 74 I can utilize 3.24 of the 4GB installed RAM.

 

With a 7200 rpm HD, 4GB of RAM and the Readyboost (if running Vista or W7), you should be about as fast as possible (make sure you disable the unnecessary programs in startup). If you can go to W7, there will be a noticeable increase over XP.

 

My biggest issue is com-port speed. This thing is HORRIFICLY slow in com-port communication. Even after upping the port-speed in Device manager.

Is there any way I can monitor com port activity, to see if there is some kind of unnecessary blockage? Or is there some way I can improve the com-speed?

Thanks!

 

There is a ton of freeware programs to monitor port speed, which are you trying to monitor? What are you using each of the ports to communicate with? What types of programs are you running and how ram intensive are they?

 

Judging by watching the task manager, they aren't too RAM intensive or processor intensive.

I want to watch port speeds while communicating with a piece of proprietary hardwear. Communication is much faster on another of my computers than it is on the CF30.

 

Which com port does it use?

 

My CF-30 mk1 communicates at the highest 115200bps speed... perhaps we can trade CF-30's then?