Upgrade Advice for my laptop

[S Freud]

I am looking at making possible upgrades to my laptop, current specs are listed below.

Compaq Presario V2000
AMD Turion64 with Mobile Tech 1.59GHz
40GB HD
ATI Shared graphics
DVD/CD-RW Drive
640MB of RAM(after shared graphics)
Total RAM: 768MB(Before shared graphics)

I am mainly looking to upgrade the HD and RAM and then maybe getting a DVD burner. I recently started developing my own site. I would like to upgrade my laptop to the point where I can run multiple web pages at the same time(around 10 or so) and also be listening to music and having some documents such as word and excel open without slowing down too much.

Also right now I am having a problem with the fan kicking on a lot more than usual, does anyone have any ideas on how to solve this?

Thanks for any suggestions.

 

[alimoalem]

as you said, ram would be an upgrade you should consider. hard drive upgrade wouldn't be bad, but i don't think it'll be worth it if you're not running out of space

i think your best bet for the dvd burner is getting an external one. i don't think compaq/hp has removable optical drives. they're rare, and expensive.

about your fan, i'm not sure if turions have speedstep or not but your CPU may just be underclocking when the full 1.6GHz isn't needed to save battery life. or, since it's winter and the air is cooler, the cpu may not need to be cooled as often.

btw, is there a budget you're looking at?

 

[corkyg]

Agree that RAM is a logical and easy upgrade. I recently upgraded my HP dv1000 to 2 GB of RAM. I also upgraded my HDD to 160 GB. Plenty of room and easy to do.

The DVD drive would not be easily replaceable. As was suggested above, an external would be a better choice. That is what I did as well - an external with Lightscribe. With the built in one, that makes for easy disk copying.

If the fan is coming on frequently, then that indicates heat is building up. You would not want to NOT turn on. This can be an indication of dust building up inside - put a good vacuum up to the colling vent slots and suck out what you can.

Heat is sort of endemic to AMD processors as compared to Intel ones - always has been. If the cleanout doesn't help, consider putting it on a cooling pad that has 2-3 built in fans. That also is a function of ambient air in your room.

Anyway - those are some of my thoughts.