Upgrade RAM or Buy New?

[Writers Coin]

So I'm still chugging along on my 5-year-old Dell Inspiron 5100, which has a Pentium 4 @ 2.8GHz. It has 512MB RAM and can get bumped up to 1GB for about $40.

It's really choppy a lot of the time and sometimes unstable. My question is, will the RAM really help with that or am I better off buying a new laptop for around $350?

I use it mostly for web browsing, blogging (wordpress), some photoshop work, email, and stuff like that. No gaming or any of that.

I've tried to keep the current system in tip top shape, but now I feel like it's just so old that it might be too old to keep running smoothly.

Any ideas?

 

[JackMDS]

WEelcome to AnandTech Forums.

Old, New are just words (good for poetry).

If the computer does what you need to do upgrade the memory.

Windows XP is significantly faster with 1GB than its performance with 512MB.

 

[Zap]

Hello Writers Coin, and welcome to Anandtech Forums.

Originally posted by: Writers Coin
It's really choppy a lot of the time and sometimes unstable.

You may want to try getting to the bottom of the instability problem before sinking money into the system because if it is unstable now it will probably still be unstable with more RAM. Being that old and a Pentium 4, I would start with cleaning out the fans/heatsinks/vents in the notebook using compressed air because overheating (from dust clogging it) can cause instability. Also, if you are on a 5 year old install of Windows, you may want to consider backing up your data and reinstalling from the restore disc. Also, try running Memtest to see if there are any memory errors, as that is probably the one easy/cheap thing to replace that may affect stability.

Another option would be to just replace the notebook with a new one. Just checking on Best Buy's web site shows three models priced at $399, all with 2GB RAM and 160GB hard drives.

 

[Blain]

Bump the memory up to 1GB, making sure to use a matching module if you're adding one.
Reinstall your XP OS.
If you're editing photos, allocate the full 256MB to video memory.

 

[Writers Coin]

Thanks for the tips! I think I'm going to buy the RAM ($34 at 4allmemory.com) and I finished running Smart Defrag too. Will that take care of the registry issues or should I get a program dedicated to cleaning up registry problems (like Auslogics Registry Defrag)?

Trying to do it without buying any software...

 

[Blain]

You've got 5 years worth of crap built up in that old OS.
A registry cleaning and defrag is not going to give you the same punch as a fresh XP reload.

Does 4allmemory state that the RAM is compatible with your Dell?

 

[Writers Coin]

Yeah I made sure that it's compatible with a couple different sites, but 4allememory has one of those handy little widgets where you punch in your make and model and they show you exactly what module you need. THen I double checked it with dell.com.

So I'm thinking I agree with reloading XP from scratch. Backing up everything on my machine is going to be a hassle though...

 

[Blain]

It's not as bad as you think.

One thing I've been doing to dramatically speed up reloads and updating is to use c't Offline Update.
You can build an iso with current updates, for buring to a bootable CD or DVD depending on what items you add to the update.
For XP I check the Windows XP "English" box, the "Include .NET Framework 3.5 SP1" box.
I leave unchecked the "Exclude Service Packs" box and check the "Clean up..." and "Verify..." boxes.
All that builds an iso a little under 1GB.

There will still be some XP updates to download after the install, but far less than allowing the Windows updater to handle it all. Way less rebooting also!