ARGH! Why is my laptop still slow with 1.25gb of ram?

[BlizzardWolf]

It's not as slow as 256mb ram before but it still lags a little when multitasking.... The PF usage seems to be a little high (around 200mb) I just did a Dell PC restore which restores it to manufactured programs and gets rid of viruses... so i should be fine there.

Do I need to upgrade to a 7200 rpm hard drive?

Do I need to do defrag my hard drive even though I just reformatted? (i've never done a defrag before)

thanks for your help! much appreciated!

Here are some pics with 1gb and 1.25gb of ram....

1gb: http://tinypic.com/euklm9.jpg

1.25gb: http://tinypic.com/euklr4.jpg

^ Why is my commit charge (k) total very close to my peak? Isn't that bad? And why is my system cache so high? (around 100,000)

 

[Jeff7181]

Looks fine to me... if you could be more specific about the problems you're having it would be easier to offer suggestions.

 

[BlizzardWolf]

Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Looks fine to me... if you could be more specific about the problems you're having it would be easier to offer suggestions.

I'm experiencing a little lag when switching between some programs (just like 1 second hesitation)..... and my PF usage is around 200mb even though i'm not running unnecessary programs at startup. Shouldn't PF usage be around 150mb?

Also, should I get 1 more GB of ram to boost the speed? or get a faster HD?

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: BlizzardWolf

Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Looks fine to me... if you could be more specific about the problems you're having it would be easier to offer suggestions.

I'm experiencing a little lag when switching between some programs (just like 1 second hesitation)..... and my PF usage is around 200mb even though i'm not running unnecessary programs at startup. Shouldn't PF usage be around 150mb?

Also, should I get 1 more GB of ram to boost the speed? or get a faster HD?

My pagefile usage is almost 300 MB... so I don't think that matters.

You have over 900 MB of free RAM, so more RAM won't help.

I guess it could be your hard drive... but if it is, it would seem like it should have always been like that. And from your post I gather that this is something new you're experiencing?

 

[BlizzardWolf]

Originally posted by: Jeff7181

Originally posted by: BlizzardWolf

Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Looks fine to me... if you could be more specific about the problems you're having it would be easier to offer suggestions.

I'm experiencing a little lag when switching between some programs (just like 1 second hesitation)..... and my PF usage is around 200mb even though i'm not running unnecessary programs at startup. Shouldn't PF usage be around 150mb?

Also, should I get 1 more GB of ram to boost the speed? or get a faster HD?

My pagefile usage is almost 300 MB... so I don't think that matters.

You have over 900 MB of free RAM, so more RAM won't help.

I guess it could be your hard drive... but if it is, it would seem like it should have always been like that. And from your post I gather that this is something new you're experiencing?

My harddrive has always been slow even with 256mb ram.... adding 1gb of ram to it made it faster but it still lags when multitasking.... (especially when scrolling down a page really fast, it's blotchy and slow sometimes, (not smooth)

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: BlizzardWolf

Originally posted by: Jeff7181

Originally posted by: BlizzardWolf

Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Looks fine to me... if you could be more specific about the problems you're having it would be easier to offer suggestions.

I'm experiencing a little lag when switching between some programs (just like 1 second hesitation)..... and my PF usage is around 200mb even though i'm not running unnecessary programs at startup. Shouldn't PF usage be around 150mb?

Also, should I get 1 more GB of ram to boost the speed? or get a faster HD?

My pagefile usage is almost 300 MB... so I don't think that matters.

You have over 900 MB of free RAM, so more RAM won't help.

I guess it could be your hard drive... but if it is, it would seem like it should have always been like that. And from your post I gather that this is something new you're experiencing?

My harddrive has always been slow even with 256mb ram.... adding 1gb of ram to it made it faster but it still lags when multitasking.... (especially when scrolling down a page really fast, it's blotchy and slow sometimes, (not smooth)

That's more related to the video processor I believe. What CPU and GPU is in the computer?

 

[edmundoab]

perhaps the OS needs a little bit of clean up then?
sometimes registry needs a little tidy up apart from the HDD troubleshoot as suggested by others

or if formatting a brand new partition helps

 

[BlizzardWolf]

Originally posted by: edmundoab
perhaps the OS needs a little bit of clean up then?
sometimes registry needs a little tidy up apart from the HDD troubleshoot as suggested by others

or if formatting a brand new partition helps

How do I clean up the OS or registry?

 

[Hacp]

What RPM HD?

 

[Jeff7181]

Oh... also turn off indexing and the last access stamp... two fairly worthless things that slow things down.

 

[BlizzardWolf]

Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Oh... also turn off indexing and the last access stamp... two fairly worthless things that slow things down.

Can you please tell me how to do that? Guide me through the steps. Thanks

 

[Unkno]

Originally posted by: BlizzardWolf

Originally posted by: edmundoab
perhaps the OS needs a little bit of clean up then?
sometimes registry needs a little tidy up apart from the HDD troubleshoot as suggested by others

or if formatting a brand new partition helps

How do I clean up the OS or registry?

CCleaner.

 

[Overkiller]

As a person not too familiar with the technicalities I would stay away from the Registry...

Post your Hard drive, CPU, and Graphic chipset specs.

Also the general make of your laptop would help

Thanks

 

[Skyhanger]

I always thought that mixing RAM was not very good for performance.
It will just go down to the speed of your slowest ram...

 

[Jiggz]

Try this onw. In System Properties ->Advance ->Performance ->Advance -> Click on Programs for the Processor Scheduling and System Cache for Memory Usage. You might also want to upgrade the hdd to at leat a 5400 RPM with 16 or 32 mb cache or better yet a 7200 RPM. Also some tweaks at TweakXP.com.

 

[exodus454]

if you have that much ram, couldnt you just disable the pagefile so that it has to load it all into ram? (thus bypassing the lag caused by a slow laptop hard drive?)

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: exodus454
if you have that much ram, couldnt you just disable the pagefile so that it has to load it all into ram? (thus bypassing the lag caused by a slow laptop hard drive?)

No... the swap file MUST exist for some programs to run correctly. If there's RAM available, it won't use the swap file, but some programs need to see that it's there in order to run correctly.

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: BlizzardWolf

Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Oh... also turn off indexing and the last access stamp... two fairly worthless things that slow things down.

Can you please tell me how to do that? Guide me through the steps. Thanks

Last access stamp off...
Open REGEDIT (Start, Run, regedit)

Navigate to : HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ System\ CurrentControlSet\ Control\ FileSystem.

Create a new DWORD value called 'NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate' and set the value to '1'


Turn off NTFS Indexing...
Open My Computer -> right-click on a Drive icon -> Select Properties -> Remove the checkmark from "Allow Indexing Service to index this disk for fast file searching" -> Click Apply. Make sure to select "Apply changes to :\, subfolders and files." before clicking OK in the new window.

Alternatively, you can go to: Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Services -> Disable Indexing Services.

 

[AMCRambler]

You don't have any expansion cards in the laptop do you? I've heard of problems where certain pcmcia cards, like NIC's or usb expansion cards can cause strange things to happen like this. If you've got any pcmcia cards in the computer try taking them out, rebooting and trying it.

EDIT: Blizzard, you didn't cut your ram with a hacksaw like they were telling you to do in THIS thread did you?????!!!!!!?????

 

[TwoBills]

I've found the "Tweaking Companion" to be very helpful. download it here