worth putting ssd and upgrading ram? or buy new

A

aegino

New Member
I have a intel core 2 duo T9600 2.8GHz processor with 6gb RAM (4+2) and 500gb 7200rpm hdd (annoying as hell = loud + slow).

What are your opinions on upgrading the RAM to 8gb (4+4) and upgrading hdd to either a 128gb or 256gb 6gb/s SSD SATA drive.

This upgrade (RAM + SSD) will cost me approximately $200 if I do 128gb SSD or $300 if I do the 256gb.

Is this worth upgrading for a laptop with not that great of a processor? Or should I save the $300 and wait to buy a better processor at a later date?


Opinions?
 
johnb35

johnb35

Administrator
Staff member
With a laptop, you are basically stuck with the processor thats in it anymore. If you want faster bootup then just get the ssd drive and call it a day. 6gb of ram is plenty for a laptop.
 
A

aegino

New Member
johnb35 said:
With a laptop, you are basically stuck with the processor thats in it anymore. If you want faster bootup then just get the ssd drive and call it a day. 6gb of ram is plenty for a laptop.
Click to expand...


Thanks, makes sense. Ran some monitoring tests and determined my hdd is definitely the bottleneck.

Few questions for you that you may know:

1) crucial.com tells me my sata version is "SATA Version -- SATA 2 - 3Gb/s" and they say that this is guaranteed compatible "128GB Crucial m4 2.5-inch SATA 6Gb/s"
-- but what would happen if use a SATA3 6gb/s? will it work? will it plug in?

2) any brands that you recommend? PNY & OCZ are cheap.. But I was told I should avoid those and spend the extra for intel or crucial.

3) i don't do games on my laptop, only use it for computing, big spreadsheets, multitasking internet and programs etc.. is 128gb enough? as boot drive and storage? currently my c is only like 65gb / 458, so I don't want to waste the $ for 256 if I'll prob update to new laptop for new cpu in 2 years anyway -- will I see a speed difference between 128gb to 256gb :S?

Thanks a ton!
 
Last edited:
voyagerfan99

voyagerfan99

Master of Turning Things Off and Back On Again
Staff member
A SATA3 drive will work, yes, but you'll max out at 3GB/s due to the older technology.

Crucial are some of the best SSD's. Others to look at are OCZ and Samsung.

128GB will be perfectly fine for you. I have a 128GB and only use about 60GB myself.
 
G80FTW

G80FTW

Active Member
voyagerfan99 said:
A SATA3 drive will work, yes, but you'll max out at 3GB/s due to the older technology.
Click to expand...

Im actually not sure where the 3GB/s and 6GB/s come from, but I read that these are not the speeds you will see. Rather:

SATA 3GB/s = 300MB/s bandwidth
SATA 6GB/s= 600MB/s bandwidth
 
A

aegino

New Member
voyagerfan99 said:
A SATA3 drive will work, yes, but you'll max out at 3GB/s due to the older technology.

Crucial are some of the best SSD's. Others to look at are OCZ and Samsung.

128GB will be perfectly fine for you. I have a 128GB and only use about 60GB myself.
Click to expand...

Thx!

So is it worth getting this upgrade from 7200rpm if I'm only able to get 3Gb/s out of it?
 
voyagerfan99

voyagerfan99

Master of Turning Things Off and Back On Again
Staff member
Big improvement. I stuck an SSD in my 3 year old Latitude E6500 and it boots in about 8 seconds.
 
Benny Boy

Benny Boy

Active Member
For Sata III, SSD's with Marvell, Indilinx , Samsung has thier own, and Intel's controllers/firmwares have more reliability than Sandforce Sata III controllers(22xx series).
 
A

aegino

New Member
just bought a crucial 128 off of hookbag :cool:

will do some sort of timed comparison and post my results here

thx e1
 
A

aegino

New Member
Great improvement

HDD vs SSD times:
1:35 vs 38 secs - full startup until internet homepage opens:
1:55 vs 44 - restart until internet homepage opens:
23 sec vs 6 sec - open 12 pdfs, file size total 350mb:
4:51 vs 1:45 - moving 7412 items, 1.14 gb of files
25 secs vs 10 secs- shutdown
 
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