Are all Laptops Pig Slow or what?

[Zak33]

My Dad's got a new Packard Bell Easy Note E6, which has a Sempron 3200+ in it and 256 DDR.

Now it boots like a mouse...it is SLOW as a tortiose I thought it was all Bloat Ware, and to be fair he like Norton stuff, so most of that is still in there, but nothing new has gone in.

I've disabled Norton Ant Virus for a test and it STILL takes 2 1/2 minutes to boot.

Is it because Lap Tops throttle themselves? Or it is simply that they run more gubbins in the back ground and despirately need 512mb.

My PC here at work is a P3 550 with 256 and it WHOOPS this Sempron 3200+ laptop 256 to death and back again

I've run MSCONFIG and trned off a few things, but most of whats running is supposed to be running.

This laptop is putting me RIGHT off laptops right now.

The chipset has set aside 64 mb for graphics leave 192 for XP, and thats probably to blame..but not entirely, surely.

I cant assign different amounts of RAM to the grpahics in BIOS...there's no option.

I'm well un-imprressed...and sadly, so is my Mum, for whom the thing was purchased brand new.

Any idea's guys? Should I just get some more ram?

[nvening]

try giving it a format and reinstalling if its clogged up

[Agent]

It has 256 meg of RAM, which wont be helping.
Then you have to remember that lappys HD's are generaly quite a bit slower than desktops. The RAM size will be causing quite a bit of swapping, on a slower drive than your used to.
You can get faster HD's for lappys, but afaik, HP dont use them in models like that.
Defo worth upgrading the RAM though.

[Zak33]

ok..wont be reinstalling...its brand new. He'd die of shock if I suggested that.

So HDD is slower....hmm....sums it up I'd say. Page File would also be slower then.

More ram? Anyidea what to get...I have zero idea what it looks like, online or anywhere.

Guess I'd best take thecase off first to see whats in the slots and what room there is.

I gotta say...so far...I hate it ...to death...in the face

[nvening]

you may be able to add another 256mb or 512mb stick but many laptops can only take one stick so you may have to completely replace the ram.

[dodgybob]

Might be woth spending £25 and putting in another 256mb in the laptop. 192mb is very low for xp and laptop hard drives certainly ain't the fastest so you probably want to avoid using the swap file as much as possible.

[Zak33]

ok..you're all pointing the same way...glad I "Asked the Audience" to be honest

gotta be brave and crack it open now!!

[Zak33]

oooh...err...before I do that...where and what ram do I need?

[rajagra]

I believe that Microsoft imposes a requirement for system builders to install Windows XP in such a way that it boots up within 30s. (That's just the Win bootup time, not the POST test etc.)
2 1/2 minutes is disgusting. Complain. My 3 year old 1GHz laptop boots in well under a minute. Always has, even when it had 256MB RAM.

EDIT> Just noticed the 64MB reserved for graphics. Can't you configure that to be only 8MB or 16MB? It's going to be rubbish for 3D games however you set it up, so optimise it for general use instead.

[Rave]

According to this it uses PC2700 SO-DIMMS. PC3200 should work fine AFAIK.

This should work fine, or pay a bit less for 256MB obv.

Edit: or dodgybob's cheaper Corsair module below.

[dodgybob]

ok..wont be reinstalling...its brand new. He'd die of shock if I suggested that.

So HDD is slower....hmm....sums it up I'd say. Page File would also be slower then.

More ram? Anyidea what to get...I have zero idea what it looks like, online or anywhere.

Guess I'd best take thecase off first to see whats in the slots and what room there is.

I gotta say...so far...I hate it ...to death...in the face

Scan stock the corsair value select sodimm range for laptops. That should fit your lappy. Might be worth swapping out the ram and replacing it with one of these 512mb modules to be certain that there wont be any timing conflicts with your old ram. Mind you I don't know how fussy laptops are these days with ram.

[Silent Shark]

Try going to crucial.com and using their memory selecter to tell you what modules the laptop can take.

You can then order them from wherever you like.

[Butcher]

My laptop boots like a rocket TBH, and in use it's as responsive as my desktop really. 3d is a bit sluggish, but for raw CPU grunt it's very competitive. So it's not all laptops that are bobbins.

I think the best bet for what you listed is more ram (as everyone else has said), low ram is going to murder XP.

[[GSV]Trig]

IMHO nobody should sell a system with XP on it and less than 512Mb RAM....

[Kumagoro]

You never know there might actually be something wrong with it. Use something like PC
check just to make sure. Run some benchmarks and see what you get. two and a half minutes is silly thats like win98.

me birds got a 800 Mhz celeron laptop with 256 and low hdd space in c chockablock full
of cack and that will boot in under two min easy.

[Zak33]

SO DIMM......

sounds like the user

Cheers guys. ta for ya help