Benchmarking results - Readyboost on Win 7, RAM and SSD upgrades.

[MSIC]

Hello all, this is where is will be posting my benchmarking for my HP DM1 laptop. I will be updating these benchmarks after I use readyboost, then install an extra 1 Gig RAM, and then install an SSD.

The laptop (see my link) initially has:
Celeron U2300 (1.2Ghz dual core, 1MB L2, 800Mhz FSB)
2 x 1 GB RAM (DDR3 SO-DIMMs), 1 of which is soldered on to the motherboard.
2.5" 5400 rpm 250GB hard drive, 8MB cache. (Seagate ST9250315AS)
Intel integrated graphics (GMA 4500MHD).
Running Win 7 Home Premium, 64 bit.

The tests are all done after booting up, and with electric power plugged in (i.e. not on battery)

Initial/baseline benchmarks
Windows Experience Index (ha!)
Processor: 3.9
Memory (RAM): 4.8
Graphics (Aero): 3.8
Gaming Graphics: 3.4
Primary Hard Disk: 5.7

SiSoft Sandra Lite 2011c
Firstly, using "Overall Score" from the 'Tools' tab:
Processor Arithmetic - Combined Score: 9.40 GOPS
Processor Multimedia - Combined Score: 19.60 Mpix/s
Memory Bandwidth - Combined Score: 3.26 GB/S
Physical Disks - Combined Score: 65.33 MB/s
Video Rendering - Combined Score: 7.34 MPix/s
Overall Score: 220

Under the 'benchmarks' tab -> storage devices -> File Systems
Driver Score: 54 MB/s (higher is better)
Random Access Time: 5.35 ms (lower is better)

[MSIC]

Am now going to enable Readyboost, using a 4GB SD card (labelled as a Play.com SDHC '6' card). (See here and here for class 6 info)
Newly formatted NTFS, giving a capacity of 3.70 GB.

Readyboost benchmarks
Windows Experience Index
Processor: 3.9
Memory (RAM): 4.8
Graphics (Aero): 3.8
Gaming Graphics: 3.4
Primary Hard Disk: 5.8

So overall, it rates me an extra 0.1 for disk access.

SiSoft Sandra Lite 2011c
Firstly, using "Overall Score" from the 'Tools' tab:
Processor Arithmetic - Combined Score: 9.43 GOPS
Processor Multimedia - Combined Score: 19.59 MPix/s
Memory Bandwidth - Combined Score: 3.73 GB/s
Physical Disks - Combined Score: 73.39 MB/s
Video Rendering - Combined Score: 7.34 MPix/s
Overall Score: 244

So it seems to have given me some greater memory bandwidth (14.5%) and a better physical disks score (12.3%).

Under the 'benchmarks' tab -> storage devices -> File Systems
Driver Score: 60.76 MB/s
Random Access Time: 3.82 ms

Both of which are better than previous (12.5% and 28%) . Interesting.

[MSIC]

My new 2GB stick of DDR3 RAM (thanks Scan!) arrived today, and was a quick and easy swap for the 1GB stick that was already there. Unfortunately the other 1GB is soldered to the board, and therefore non-replaceable.
This may mean that I am no longer running dual-channel (is this true?? - how would I find out??). Still, let's see what the benchmarks show.

3GB RAM (total) benchmarks (note that I also still have ReadyBoost enabled, as before).
Windows Experience Index
Processor: 3.9
Memory (RAM): 4.7
Graphics (Aero): 3.8
Gaming Graphics: 3.4
Primary Hard Disk: 5.8

So it overall gives me a 0.1 point less than before for memory

SiSoft Sandra Lite 2011c
Firstly, using "Overall Score" from the 'Tools' tab:
Processor Arithmetic - Combined Score: 9.43 GOPS
Processor Multimedia - Combined Score: 19.60 MPix/s
Memory Bandwidth - Combined Score: 3.81 GB/s
Physical Disks - Combined Score: 64.93 MB/s
Video Rendering - Combined Score: 7.37 MPix/s
Overall Score: 230.

For some reason, the 'physical disks' score is significantly lower than last time. Curious.

Under the 'benchmarks' tab -> storage devices -> File Systems
Driver Score: 43.55 MB/s
Random Access Time: 63ms (not 6.3, but 63!)

Edit
When I refreshed it again, i get:
Driver Score: 58.8 MB/s
Random Access Time: 7.3ms

Refreshed a third time I get:
Driver Score: 60.5 MB/s
Random Access Time: 4.74ms

This is bizzare, and surely the extremely high variability of this firstly goes some way to demonstrating what I have been so unhappy with my drive, but also casts doubt on the earlier results

[MSIC]

I have now disabled ReadyBoost.

3GB RAM (total) benchmarks (without ReadyBoost).
Windows Experience Index
Processor: 3.9
Memory (RAM): 4.7
Graphics (Aero): 3.8
Gaming Graphics: 3.4
Primary Hard Disk: 5.8

(so this is no change, although the Primary Hard Disk score remains 0.1 better than the initial baseline)

SiSoft Sandra Lite 2011c
Firstly, using "Overall Score" from the 'Tools' tab:
Processor Arithmetic - Combined Score: 9.43 GOPS
Processor Multimedia - Combined Score: 19.60 MPix/s
Memory Bandwidth - Combined Score: 3.86 GB/s
Physical Disks - Combined Score: 62.00 MB/s
Video Rendering - Combined Score: 7.37 MPix/s
Overall Score: 225

So Memory Bandwidth is the best yet (!), although again a lower Physical Disks score

Under the 'benchmarks' tab -> storage devices -> File Systems
I will now run this 3 times as follows:
Driver Score: 31.68 MB/s , 53.1 MB/s , 49.24 MB/s
Random Access Time:76.4ms , 23ms , 752μs

These results are just weird. I'm not happy with them at all, as it could mean absolutely anything.
This feels that it frankly makes the whole experiment a waste of time.

[MSIC]

ReadyBoost re-enabled, although I have formatted the SD card and then re-enabled it (as I probably should have done the first time).

3GB RAM (total) benchmarks (with ReadyBoost enabled AFTER installing the new RAM).
Windows Experience Index
Processor: 3.9
Memory (RAM): 4.7
Graphics (Aero): 3.8
Gaming Graphics: 3.4
Primary Hard Disk: 5.8

No change.

SiSoft Sandra Lite 2011c
Firstly, using "Overall Score" from the 'Tools' tab:
Processor Arithmetic - Combined Score: 9.43 GOPS
Processor Multimedia - Combined Score: 19.59 MPix/s
Memory Bandwidth - Combined Score: 3.46 GB/s
Physical Disks - Combined Score: 61.03 MB/s
Video Rendering - Combined Score: 7.33 MPix/s
Overall Score: 216

Memory bandwidth is down

Under the 'benchmarks' tab -> storage devices -> File Systems
I will now run this 3 times as follows:
Driver Score: 56.58 MB/s , 14.25 MB/s , 57.52 MB/s
Random Access Time: 5.78ms , 631ms , 4.76ms

Well, that middle run is a joke (but i'm not laughing!).
What the hell ??????

[kalniel]

I think ReadyBoost only shows a difference if you're really quite low on system RAM. Physical disks do have a lot of variability, it's one of the reasons benchmarking sites liked the transition to SSDs - they're far more consistent run to run.

[MSIC]

Indeed, that's pretty much what I am seeing now.
I will probably do a results & conclusions section at the end of this process - am expecting my SSD to arrive in a couple of days.

[MSIC]

Provisional Results & Summary (although SSD results to follow).
So, overall there is alot of consistency from the Windows Experience Index.
This is both a good thing and bad, in that it doesn't suggest any improvements of having added an extra Gig of RAM, nor of using Windows' own ReadyBoost technology (at least, not with the class 6 SD card I used); neither however does it seem to have massive swings in the results.

Which brings me to using SiSoft Sandra, and so far i am hugely disappointed.
Perhaps the problem here is me and my expectations (ie that I would gain near-scientifically reliable results), or perhaps it is being completely accurate and there are huge variations with my laptop's hard drive.
On the plus side, everything CPU-tested appears virtually 100% consistent, which is what you would expect.

It's a shame that I can't see a particular pattern with memory bandwidth.

The real downer though is the ridiculous results / variations with the hard drive - I wished that I had ran them 5 times each from the start, but I am clearly having huge differences as follows:
The best 'driver score' was 60.76 MB/s (with using ReadyBoost but only 2GB RAM), but the worst was 14.25 MB/s (ReadyBoost and 3GB RAM) - over 75% less!
Even worse was Random Access Time, from 631 ms down to 752 μs.
Am I correct that this is nearly 1000 times the difference?
Worse was there is no pattern to this that I can see. It just seems random.

The one thing that is worth mentioning is that using both ReadyBoost, and particularly the extra Gig of RAM does seem to have helped a little with the general (subjective) feel of using Windows.

Let's see what the SSD can bring to the party.

[MSIC]

My SSD has now arrived, however i'm going to do one last run before installing it.
I have updated the BIOS and also installed the recommended HP driver for the chipset (i do not know if this is newer or older than the Intel one I had previously).

Updated BIOS, latest chipset driver from HP website, 3GB RAM, ReadyBoost enabled
Windows Experience Index
Processor: 3.9
Memory (RAM): 4.7
Graphics (Aero): 3.8
Gaming Graphics: 4.0
Primary Hard Disk: 5.8

Well blow me down with a feather. Of course, it's 'gaming graphics' that has improved here (note that i havent changed the Intel Graphics Driver).

SiSoft Sandra Lite 2011c
Firstly, using "Overall Score" from the 'Tools' tab:
Processor Arithmetic - Combined Score: 9.12 GOPS
Processor Multimedia - Combined Score: 19.60 MPix/s
Memory Bandwidth - Combined Score: 3.79 GB/s
Physical Disks - Combined Score: 60.73 MB/s
Video Rendering - Combined Score: 7.37 MPix/s
Overall Score:220

Under the 'benchmarks' tab -> storage devices -> File Systems
I will now run this 3 times as follows:
Driver Score: 32.7 MB/s , 52.87 MB/s , 49 MB/s
Random Access Time: 39 ms , 4.81 ms , 47.64 ms

So overall, things still benchmark much the same (other than the odd graphics result above).
I would add the subjectively things feel a little better though.

Time now for the SSD

[MSIC]

OK, SSD time!

Firstly, i copied a Ghost image of my previous installation onto my new Kingston V100 64GB SSD.
In theory, this has "read speed 250 MB/s write speed 145 MB/s".

On first boot back into Windows 7, it didnt get back into the OS proper but Windows recovery mode, and was able to self-repair.
On second boot, I was into Windows 7 with all my regular applications (as you would expect).
I rebooted a third time, on advice of the OS, as it had loaded the Kingston SSD driver.
The fourth time in to the OS, i followed most of the advice here about disabling Superfetch, Drive Indexing, defrags, search indexing and enabled write caching (called slightly differently under Win 7). Finally rebooted again, and now ready for benchmarking.

I note also that ReadyBoost is auto-disabled.

SSD installed, 3GB RAM, no ReadyBoost.
Windows Experience Index
Processor: 3.9
Memory (RAM): 4.7
Graphics (Aero): 3.8
Gaming Graphics: 4.0
Primary Hard Disk: 6.9

So clearly Windows thinks that there is a big difference.

SiSoft Sandra Lite 2011c
Firstly, using "Overall Score" from the 'Tools' tab:
Processor Arithmetic - Combined Score: 9.43 GOPS
Processor Multimedia - Combined Score: 19.59 MPix/s
Memory Bandwidth - Combined Score: 3.56 GB/s
Physical Disks - Combined Score: 237.88 MB/s
Video Rendering - Combined Score: 7.38 MPix/s
Overall Score: 559

Woo-hoo! Dramatically better disk throughput, pretty much in line with their specs

Under the 'benchmarks' tab -> storage devices -> File Systems
I will now run this 3 times as follows:
Driver Score: 205.33 MB/s , 204 MB/s , 207 MB/s
Random Access Time: 1ms , 994 μs, 948 μs

Fantastic. Not only are these dramatically better, but they are also broadly consistent.

The final job here will be to summarise my findings and experiences.

[MSIC]

Summary

I'm going to begin with my experiences. Overall I was left somewhat dismayed by this process, at least whilst still having my seagate hard disk drive inside the laptop. Maybe the drive itself was rubbish (it certainly felt slow enough for me to want to begin this whole process), but the sheer inconsistency of some of the drive results of SiSoft Sandra were very poor. I don't know where to find fault with that, but it makes me think that my initial few benchmark results are not reliable.

This then leads to my subjective experiences.
The ReadyBoost did seem to help a little. For anyone with a spare SD card and a slot, why not take advantage. For this, I would agree with the benchmarks - it did seem to help a little.

Adding an extra Gig of RAM again also helped a little. I must remain aware however that by installing, and having a desire for it to be better (it was my own money and effort after all) I was clearly biased, and looked for the best. Since i cant trust the objective tests, i can say that subjectively it was acceptable.

Disabling and then re-enabling ReadyBoost didnt seem to do much. With hindsight, I should have done this first, but there you go.

Updating the BIOS and adding the official HP driver was actually noticeable though. Again with hindsight this really should have been done before any testing, but i'm glad i remembered to do this.

Without a single shadow of a doubt however, and quite as expected, was that adding the SSD has changed things the most. Booting is quicker (the Windows logo on startup only just has time to be displayed before it's into the desktop), everything is responsive (more so than my Core2Quad desktop PC), and is exactly how I could have hoped it would be.

Overall for £85 (including the external case kit, giving me a 250GB ext. hard drive now as well) buying this Kingston SSDnow V100 64GB drive was well worth it for me. Highly recommended.

[duc]

1GB + 2GB dual channel runs in what Intel calls 'Flex Mode'. 1GB from each channel will run in DC mode, the remaining 1GB is SC mode. This does have a impact on performance, compared to a dual channel system, if the PC consistently have to access the single channel memory.