Slow PC Part 2...
Sunday, July 29, 2018 by kona0197 | Discussion: Personal Computing
So I finally got tired of the old computer being slow. Saved up some money and bought a new Dell. It has a dual core AMD 7th generation A6 CPU running at 2 GHZ but it can go higher, up to 2.7 GHz when it needs to, 4 GB DDR4, 500 GB hard drive, and Radeon graphics. It seems fast enough for my everyday tasks and games, but barely. No lag on startup, just a slight lag opening apps or new tabs in Chrome. Of course I used my copy of Windows 10 version 1604 and installed it over what came on the computer to get rid of the bloatware, than installed the latest drivers for all devices I knew needed them. Had to turn of some visual effects, I think that helped, but it's still not as fast a system as I would like. So I need help with the following options. Should I...
1. Buy a 256GB SSD and 4 GB of DDR4 RAM to speed up the system or...
2. Take it back to the store, spend another $200 to get something with at least a Core i3 CPU and 8 GB of RAM or...
3. Buy a Mac. I can get a 2010 model for about 300 with OSX Sierra installed with 4 GB of RAM and a 256 GB hard drive...
Keep in ind I have watched how to take this Dell apart on YouTube and install the RAM and SSD. Looks easy enough but I'm afraid I would foul something up. Local shop can get me a 256 GB SSD, install it, and clone my existing drive for $250. Not sure what to do here. The Mac sounds tempting...
Thanks guys..
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Reply #22 Monday, July 30, 2018 12:30 PM
It's even better than moving from a ide drive to a raid drive. Which was a makedly better performance especially in gaming. Sorry stupid auto correct.
Reply #23 Monday, July 30, 2018 12:54 PM
Guys I know this notebook isn't a fast one but it's fast enough for me for the moment. Can't wait to see how fast it will work with the SSD and 8GB of DDR4. Here are some times I recorded for anyone that wants to know...
Booting from a complete shutdown to seeing the log on screen: 50 seconds
Time from entering the system password to a usable desktop with all background apps loaded: 3 seconds
Complete restart from the Windows desktop back to the log on screen: 1 minute, 55 seconds
Open Microsoft Word: 12 seconds
Open Chrome and load 5 tabs from previous session: 23 seconds
Open Facebook in chrome - the most memory intensive website I visit: 4 seconds
Open Hoyle Card Games 2013 - The newest game I own: 18 seconds
Open Windows Mail - 11 seconds
It's not unbearable, I know it could be better. But it's faster than the old HP I had a month ago. Maybe a newer dual core system has better cores than an old quad core system. Seems faster. But it's AMD so it runs hot, around 95 degrees. :/
Reply #25 Tuesday, July 31, 2018 12:37 AM
Can't wait to see how fast it will work with the SSD and 8GB of DDR4.
Yeah, those upgrades would see a performance increase. Thing is, you don't have to do both at once. The RAM would be the more expensive, so if you can't afford it straight up, you could always wait and just get the SSD to start. That in itself would see a significant boost while you save for the DDR4... which has also seen a drop in price in recent months.
Anyhow, kona, all the best with it. 
Reply #26 Wednesday, August 1, 2018 11:29 AM
OK guys, if your willing to put up with the bad music and length here is a video of my model being upgraded. I'm OK getting the screws and keyboard out, but those little ribbon cables might be too tricky. The local shop wants $50 to do it but the thought of someone else upgrading the system scares me a bit. What if they screw it up?
Reply #27 Wednesday, August 1, 2018 11:49 AM
Don't worry about taking your machine to a techie, they do this stuff all the time and would likely do a more efficient job quicker than you could.
And 50 bucks is pretty decent, so me, I'd go for it.
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Reply #21 Monday, July 30, 2018 10:31 AM
To say forget about the SSD, obviously you've not done a HDD to SSD upgrade. I have and the performance hit is significant.
Particularly if the HD is a 5400...