AMD 64 in a laptop

[ShellGuy]

Hey everybody this is my first post so be kind. LOL.... I am looking for a new laptop for home/Business use. I want to base it off of the AMD 64 chip. I know E-Machine has one with a nice price but i would like to be able to up grade the ram. Basicaly I would like to be able to upgrade the ram and Video in it and i would be happy. The Voodoo is way out there as is the Hypersonic one. Hyperdata i would like to have a DVD burner. H

Here is what i would like.
upgradeable to 2gig
DVD burner / CD burner
Video 128mb
Onboard Wireless a/b/g
and of course the AMD 64 chip

Any info is help.

Will

 

[MatthewF01]

any reason you need 2GB of RAM?

Rarely do I see people exceeding that much in their DESKTOPS, let alone a MOBILE system!


I bought the eMachines m6805 lil over a week ago for my first ever laptop (early HS grad. present, or at least half of it... i shelled out a few $$) and I am nothing but impressed. Its an absolutely rocksolid machine and serves me well as a secondary computer.

The eMachines can go up to 1.25GB of RAM, but if you physically dissasembled the system you MAY be able to utilize more by swapping the 256mb stick in the hidden slot... not sure about that yet.

You have the option on the m6807 for a DVD burner, and I sorta wish I had it, as not even my desktop has one and now im starting to see its usefulness in backups, etc.

There isnt gonna be a tremendous difference ina 128mb video solutionas opposed to this 9600 non-pro with 64... plus it overclocks like nobody's business!
Stock speeds:
GPU: 297mhz
DDR MEM: 200mhz

Overclocked up to:
GPU:430mhz
DDR MEM: 225mhz

Its even possible to overclock the processor a bit as well! Some people have taken it from the stock 1.8ghz up to 2.1ghz! I run mine between 1.9 and 2ghz usually (unless im on battery).



its quality stuff... if you want to avoid spending the big bucks you might have to come to terms with the fact that you wont be able to get just what you want unless you really break the bank. The emachines is solid, my man.

and let me be the first to welcome you to Anandtech, its a wonderfully diverse community to share opinions in and Ive learned nearly all I know in here (minus how to please the ladies... Off-Topic thread, anyone? )

 

[ShellGuy]

Thanks for the info Matt. I was going to get the M6807 which is the one you were talking about with the burner. I will have to do more, research on the subject as the 6807 is hard to come by and only The CITY has them right now. I have never overclocked anything but maybe this is a time 2 start. LOL.....

Will

 

[MatthewF01]

Originally posted by: ShellGuy
Thanks for the info Matt. I was going to get the M6807 which is the one you were talking about with the burner. I will have to do more, research on the subject as the 6807 is hard to come by and only The CITY has them right now. I have never overclocked anything but maybe this is a time 2 start. LOL.....

Will

yea hopefully after a while the DVD burner drive will become separately available so I could swap mine out... damn.

Check out the following links for 'research':

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=51&threadid=1228136&forumid=1
http://dexplor.com/phpBB2/viewforum.php?f=2&sid=af08b57b95a65acd960848bff1245996
http://forums.amd.com/index.php?showforum=4

http://www6.tomshardware.com/mobile/20031216/index.html a lot of people will tell you Toms Hardware is a crock, and I whole-heartedly agree, but this talks about the mobile athlon64 and also talks smack about the fact that it clocks down to 800mhz on batteries. All I have to say is DONT WORRY, there are ways around this I am using, temp solutions if you will. More on this later, if youre interested and the 800mhz issue bothers you...


And when youre ready to overclock, you better believe this is the place to come to! If youre familiar with benchmarking computer performance, in one popular program 3dmark2001, before overclocking I got around 9000 '3dmarks'. After overclocking the system, I got 11,557 which rivals a lot of desktop systems!

 

[EcoLogic]

Welcome to AnandTech, I am fairly new as well. Nice bunch of people here.

I must say though, that 2 gigs of RAM would be a waste and shouldn't be a reason to not go with the eMachine system.

 

[MDE]

Matthew, what's your temporary solution for the 800MHz issue?

 

[RedWolf]

I've had my 6805 for about a month now. I did research for about two weeks on various laptops before picking it up for $1300 after rebates. I'm very happy with it. I haven't overclocked it, yet as I haven't had much need for it. I also haven't done anything to fix the 800mhz battery issue as it still has plenty of power to run anything I have run on batteries (games run okay but I don't usually play on battery power). It is a little heavy compared to a thin and light laptop but it isn't terrible.

I bought it as a desktop/laptop replacement. It replaced my wife's pc and my Toshiba S103 laptop. It has been a stellar replacement on both accounts. I also wanted a laptop that could function as a lan machine. Again, the 6805 came through. I went to a lan on saturday and the 6805 breezed through UT2k4 Demo, UT2k3, Call of Duty, and functioned as a Dungeon Seige server while playing DS.

 

[MatthewF01]

my solution is primarily ClockGen and SpeedSwitchXP.

On AC, speedswitch dynamically switches between a few speeds to keep it quiet most of the time, but when it needs the extra horsepower it kicks it in as needed.

however on batteries speedswitch reports 800mhz as being the MAX AND MIN speeds, so its still switchin speeds but just 2 of the same settings...

So I made 1 Ghost mode shortcuts for Clockgen to put on the desktop. One is 800mhz low power and the other is 1800mhz. So when on battery, I hit the 1800mhz shortcut and it kicks right in.


THen I disabled powerplay (caused games to crash on battery mode) and used ATITool to make a number of preset speed settings for the GPU/MEM.

 

[MDE]

What version of Clockgen are you using, all of the AMD64 versions either don't change the clock speed or the speed gets reset after I close Clockgen.

 

[CruisinGT]

Originally posted by: MonkeyDriveExpress
What version of Clockgen are you using, all of the AMD64 versions either don't change the clock speed or the speed gets reset after I close Clockgen.

I'm using ClockGen for ICS950405 (Version 1.04) and it allows me to change the clock speed and retain that speed after I close Clockgen. I also have my power scheme set to 'Always On' which maybe the cause why it's not resetting itself since the speed is always constant.


Matthew, I'd like to know how you got Ghost mode to work. I've tried using its default ini file, changing it to a text file, omitting the AGP setting, etc but everytime I try to use my shortcut (which is currently configured as "c:\clockgen\clockgen.exe -file=2025Spec.txt"), it returns an error message stating 'Error reading param file !'
Are you using that same version?? How did you get your to work??

 

[MatthewF01]

I use the 03 version because I read most people had luck with that one.. never bothered with the other versions. Give that one a shot, Monkey.


Cruisin, as far as ghost mode goes, it took me a while to figure out how to get it working... after looking on their site and at that ini file I got it.

First off what you have to know is that the file extension needs to be CKG. they dont really clearly state that anywhere...

so instead of
c:\clockgen\clockgen.exe -file=2025Spec.txt

try
c:\clockgen\clockgen.exe -file=2025Spec.ckg
and change the file extension from txt to ckg as well!
that should do it...

also, since this is Athlon64, in configuring a ghost file should we be setting FSB or HTT? I still am very unclear about the whole 'athlon64 doesnt have a fsb' deal...

 

[alexruiz]

The 800 MHz issue is exclusive to WinXP. PowerNOW! for Windows 2000 works great

 

[ShellGuy]

So you are sayin that if i run Win2k that i won't have the speed problem? I was going to reformat my drive anyways. I hate XP Home. By the way where did everybody get their laptops?

Will

 

[Amaretto]

Try Ibuypower notebooks, it has the AMD 64 mobile version and it has the 128MB Radeon 9600 Pro and the basic price is $1,659 and you can upgrade on their website like the hardrives if you want the 7200 rpm or you can add more memory but of course, the price would go up.
http://www.ibuypower.com/confirm/configurator-battalion-SL.htm

 

[alexruiz]

Originally posted by: ShellGuy
So you are sayin that if i run Win2k that i won't have the speed problem? I was going to reformat my drive anyways. I hate XP Home. By the way where did everybody get their laptops?

Will

That is correct. the machine is 100% compatible with win2k, and all the drivers included work also for win2k. My perception, in fact, is that with the exception of the boot and shutdown time, it feels faster in win2K than it was in XP home. Very stable also, and the powerNOW! for win2k adjusts to 1800 MHz if needed.

 

[ShellGuy]

Did anybody else happen to go to the Ibuypower.com link and look at this thing? Its a great system. The only problem I am having is that when you want to upgrade the DVD it says DVD-RW and in the specs sheet at the lower portion of the page it says that it is a DVD+RW. Can anybody tell me 4 sure which it is. I tryed to call their sales line and got nothing but this ext is busy would you like to leave a message. Not a good way 2 sell a product. But i do like the fact that I can upgrade the Hdd for just $119 instead of 200+ like i have been seeing. I may go with Ibuypower.com but not sure yet.

Will

PS thanks for the info on Win2k and the laptop i was gunna format the drive anyways.

 

[CruisinGT]

Matt,

Heh....well...I went ahead and renamed the file extension to CKG and relinked it as you suggested but I was still unable to get ghosting mode to work properly. So I decided to abandon the ICS950405 version and try the ICS950403 version that you're working with.

Ah, progress. It seems that ClockGen runs through the text file without that annoying pop-up error. In fact, it doesn't seem to care whether it has the extension CKG, INI or TXT!!

However, it's still not running completely correct. During ghost mode, I can change the processor voltage, the CPU multiplier but it won't allow me to the adjust the FSB setting. No matter whether it was was my only setting, whether I left the AGP setting in or out, whether I matched the AGP to the FSB (i.e. FSB=210, so AGP=70 if not locked), etc. Does your FSB change as desired when in ghosting mode, Matt?

Originally posted by: MatthewF01
also, since this is Athlon64, in configuring a ghost file should we be setting FSB or HTT? I still am very unclear about the hole 'athlon64 doesnt have a fsb' deal...

Well, that would really depend on how they programmed ClockGen. I would hope that if the FSB value command had changed from prior versions that they would note it on their readme file. They could name those values anything they want, the user would have to know their naming scheme to be useful.

 

[CruisinGT]

Originally posted by: ShellGuy
Did anybody else happen to go to the Ibuypower.com link and look at this thing? Its a great system. The only problem I am having is that when you want to upgrade the DVD it says DVD-RW and in the specs sheet at the lower portion of the page it says that it is a DVD+RW. Can anybody tell me 4 sure which it is. I tryed to call their sales line and got nothing but this ext is busy would you like to leave a message. Not a good way 2 sell a product. But i do like the fact that I can upgrade the Hdd for just $119 instead of 200+ like i have been seeing. I may go with Ibuypower.com but not sure yet.

Yeah, it did seem like a pretty good system. I think its strongpoint is customability. You are starting with a pricetag that is $200 more expensive than the e-machine. For that extra $200, you're buying the Pro version of the MRadeon (which includes 64Mb of extra video ram) and the ABILITY to customize.

Everything else is pretty much the same or worse.
-RAM upgrade: Maximum memory upgrade supported is only 1 Gig whereas the eMachine can be upgraded to a minimum of 1.25 Gb and possibly 2Gb if you know how to get to that other slot as some people have done. Not sure why there's that limit. It could be an iBuyPower documentaion issue or or an actual design issue.
-Screen: IBuypower's screen is slightly smaller (.4") than the eMachine yet supports a higher native resolution. This means that at default, everything will appear smaller although you will have more real estate. I'm not one to have 640x480 resolution on 17" screens but I know I'm comfortable with eMachine's native resolution. I'd have to actually see this screen to know if it is comfortable to look at or would I have to squint. Sure, you can lower the resolution but if 1400x1050 is actually native, then you'll be doing it in expense for quality as no lcd looks good outside its native resolution.
-No wireless adapter without having to fork over another $40? What are they thinking?? There's a reason why airports and some hotels are starting to offer wireless internet access!! You'll definitely need this, especially if you're on the run and I'm thinking that's the case if you're getting a laptop. So you fork over the extra $40 and well, I hope you didn't have anything else planned for that PCMCIA slot cuz you're out now.

But like I said, its strongpoint is customability. If you're going all out like upgrading the processor, the HD, etc. for that ultimate laptop without the ultimate price then I can see the advantage to this laptop. I've purchased a system from iBuypower previously and I can't complain about their tech support either. They were good to me. Unfortunately, regarding the DVD burner, unless someone has purchased it here, there's really no way of knowing what they are using for a DVD burner on their laptops without talking to someone.... as their website is not very specific regarding internal parts.

Anyway, that was my 2 ....bucks.

 

[MatthewF01]

Originally posted by: CruisinGT
Matt,

Heh....well...I went ahead and renamed the file extension to CKG and relinked it as you suggested but I was still unable to get ghosting mode to work properly. So I decided to abandon the ICS950405 version and try the ICS950403 version that you're working with.

Ah, progress. It seems that ClockGen runs through the text file without that annoying pop-up error. In fact, it doesn't seem to care whether it has the extension CKG, INI or TXT!!

However, it's still not running completely correct. During ghost mode, I can change the processor voltage, the CPU multiplier but it won't allow me to the adjust the FSB setting. No matter whether it was was my only setting, whether I left the AGP setting in or out, whether I matched the AGP to the FSB (i.e. FSB=210, so AGP=70 if not locked), etc. Does your FSB change as desired when in ghosting mode, Matt?

Originally posted by: MatthewF01

mine reads as follows:

[CG-ICS950403]
VID=1.400
FID=9.0
FSB=166

However Im clocking it up just using the multiplier... so I dont even know if the FSB setting is kicking in. But when it clocks the sys down to 800mhz, its not modifying the FSB value at all, solely voltage and multiplier. Hence my modifying those values... the only reason I put that FSB command in was to make sure it stayed in spec...
I dont think its working though because I tried making one to clock the system up to 1900mhz by modifying the FSB value and it wouldnt work, though I didnt spend long attempting to fix it. Might try making one that changes FSB value, and a copy that changes HTT value, and see which one works. Surely one will get the speed change to kick in.
also, since this is Athlon64, in configuring a ghost file should we be setting FSB or HTT? I still am very unclear about the hole 'athlon64 doesnt have a fsb' deal...

Well, that would really depend on how they programmed ClockGen. I would hope that if the FSB value command had changed from prior versions that they would note it on their readme file. They could name those values anything they want, the user would have to know their naming scheme to be useful.

 

[Heinrich]

iBuyPower looks nice but you can't get 3 year warranty. What kind of reputation do these guys have? How is their customer support? What happens if the CPU dies on month 19? Too many unknowns.

 

[Amaretto]

Just type ibuypower reviews and look at their reviews, here's one of em. but it's on their desktop. It should provide some background on what kind of company they are.
http://reviews.cnet.com/4505-3118_7-30725742.html

 

[Heinrich]

I found the reseller ratings. The Return or Replacement is low but the rest is good. What do you guys think? Reseller Ratings IBuyPower

 

[eastvillager]

You can put 2 gig of ram in a 6805/7. If you buy the 6805/7 from best buy with their extended warranty, you won't even void the warranty doing so.

I upgraded both of the sodimms in mine so that I'd have a gig of ram. I don't have any application that would be bottlenecked by only having a gig of ram before it would be bottlenecked by disk, video, or cpu.