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Computer help...

Duuuuuuuude

Duuuuuuuude

Suck it up!
Moderator
Joined
Mar 9, 2008
Messages
11,649
Location
Arkansas
I'm using a 4 year old e-machine. Works fine, never had any issues with it other than a failed power supply.

It is getting slow in its old age. I've cleaned as much as I know to clean but its still a bit slow. Both hard drives are only about half full.

What I want to know is:

1. Is there some other maintenence I could be doing to help it along?
2. Would a hardware upgrade help? Like more/better memory.

Here's the specs...

AMD Sempron 3100+
1.81ghz
384bm ram

If that isn't enough info, tell me what you need to know.

I don't want to spend buku bucks upgrading an old computer, but I don't mind spending a few to make this one a bit better.

Thoughts?
 
Just got an add from Dell for a new desk top for 385.00
thats your best bet....


more mem. might help

do the disk cleanup and a defrag.. that moght help also
 
I defrag every couple of months whether it tells me I need to or not.

Same with the disk cleanup, though I'll do that once a month.
 
JeremyH said:
Do you have a bunch of unnecessary junk running in the background?
Click to expand...

Examples?

If I feel its running especially slow, I'll pull up task manager and see whats on. There is a fair sized list (42 processes), but 99% of it isn't doing anything. Most of the time the cpu isn't running hard at all.
 
If it has onboard video, go into the bios and drop down the amount allotted to video. I have a 4 or 5 year old Emachine right here I just did a reinstall on, a W3107, Sempron 1.8(3100+) with 512(3200 spd) of mem. Looks to be the same as yours. It was giving 128 to video so only 384 for the OS, they are the most basic of users so I dropped it down to 64 for video, may even drop to 32 for them.

Go into the bios and see what is alloted for video, again only applies if onboard video.
 
More RAM would help a lot, though for the age of the machine, I can't say if it would be worth it.

Look at this way, for the price of a new desktop, even the Fry's specials or other cheap ones, and in fact some netbooks, are going to be faster than that machine. And you can usually pick up some tihng fairly nice for under 500.

Now ask yourself, is spending a 100 or so on some new RAM, giving you a small % increase of performance going to be worth it when you calculate in other risks such as other hardware failures. Are you willing to spend that money to get just a little more time out of it?

Only you can answer some of these questions; what kind of budget you are on, etc.

You are probably running XP? If so, 2GB of RAM would help out a lot. Though you would need to check to see if your computer can handle it. If not, than 1GB.

SS
 
Scattman said:
If it has onboard video, go into the bios and drop down the amount allotted to video. I have a 4 or 5 year old Emachine right here I just did a reinstall on, a W3107, Sempron 1.8(3100+) with 512(3200 spd) of mem. Looks to be the same as yours. It was giving 128 to video so only 384 for the OS, they are the most basic of users so I dropped it down to 64 for video, may even drop to 32 for them.

Go into the bios and see what is alloted for video, again only applies if onboard video.
Click to expand...

Its got a GeForce 6100 with 128mb of memory. I don't know if its a card or if its part of the system. It does say "bus: integrated".

My comp is used mainly for internet and games (off the hard drive, not the net), so I really don't want to crank the video down unless I have to. Would more memory be a solution? Sounds like it could be...
 
salmonshark said:
Only you can answer some of these questions; what kind of budget you are on, etc.

You are probably running XP? If so, 2GB of RAM would help out a lot. Though you would need to check to see if your computer can handle it. If not, than 1GB.

SS
Click to expand...

If it takes more than $200 to make this one better, I'd rather go buy a new 'puter.

Running XP. How do I know if it'll handle more ram?
 
Yep, sounds like a dedicated card.

As stated, you really need some memory although DDR 3200 isn't that cheap anymore, at least compared to the newer stuff. You would see a difference if it had 1 gig.

Personally I would slap some memory in it. You could add 512 to what you have now. A little cheaper. *












*Now the one I have here I was going to add some mem. to it but it doesn't like any of the 3200 spd sticks I have, even though it runs at 3200. I have 3 512 sticks and a 1 gig stick of 3200 and it hates them all.
 
Scattman said:
Yep, sounds like a dedicated card.

As stated, you really need some memory although DDR 3200 isn't that cheap anymore, at least compared to the newer stuff. You would see a difference if it had 1 gig.

Personally I would slap some memory in it. You could add 512 to what you have now. A little cheaper. *

*Now the one I have here I was going to add some mem. to it but it doesn't like any of the 3200 spd sticks I have, even though it runs at 3200. I have 3 512 sticks and a 1 gig stick of 3200 and it hates them all.
Click to expand...


Your * scares me. :ror:

I found this...

http://www.edgetechcorp.com/memory/..._medium=Feed&utm_campaign=GData&utm_term=6929

and this...

http://www.impactcomputers.com/me512ddr3200.html

Am I on the right track? If I do buy, I should be able to get it locally at Staples.
 
Last edited:
Scattman said:
No on the 1st, yes on the 2nd. It is probably 3200 spd, not 2700. Need to look at your stick to make sure.

What model # is yours?
Click to expand...

I need to take my comp out to the garage and blow it out again, so I'll get some info off of the stick thats in there.

M# W3107
 
if ur a gamer. i personally think u need much more ram. but i guess that really depends on the games ur playing. eventually u will run into a game that u will need a better video card. then more ram. soon ur hard drive will be full... and so on...

best bet it to pick up something new. 4gb, 500mb, 2ghz. i would also pick up a 1tera portable to back up ur files. this can all be done for under $700
 
Scattman said:
Need to look at your stick to make sure.
Click to expand...

#'s from the stick...

NT512D648HCOG-5T
512MB
DDR-400MHz-CL3
PC 3200U-30331

robbio4422 said:
if ur a gamer. i personally think u need much more ram. but i guess that really depends on the games ur playing. eventually u will run into a game that u will need a better video card. then more ram. soon ur hard drive will be full... and so on...

best bet it to pick up something new. 4gb, 500mb, 2ghz. i would also pick up a 1tera portable to back up ur files. this can all be done for under $700
Click to expand...

Thats way more hardcore than I need. I usually play C&C if I really get bored, my son has a handfull of others that he plays. Nothing to taxing, no internet play.

The only really serious thing I do on here is my taxes, which is once a year, and when I'm done with that, the info gets transferred onto a zip drive and tossed into a lock box.

There are no movie files, music files, stuff like that. The only thing I'd really be heartbroken to lose would be several years worth of pictures, but most of the important ones have been burned onto a disk.
 
Yep, that 3200 stick you linked to should work. If I was you I would lean towards something like you linked to. It says right there it will work with yours. Like I said, I have a machine identical to yours on the bench right now and it is picky about ram.

I'm like robbio, the more memory the better. 4 gigs of DDR2 6400 in this one on XP, 4 gigs of 5300 in the laptop with Vista.

Just bumping yours to 1 gig will make a big difference over your 512 minus what is pulled for video. This can be done for less than 50 vs 3-400 to build a new tower. If you are on a budget the choice is clear. "thumbsup"

Duuuuuuuude said:
#'s from the stick...

NT512D648HCOG-5T
512MB
DDR-400MHz-CL3
PC 3200U-30331



Thats way more hardcore than I need. I usually play C&C if I really get bored, my son has a handfull of others that he plays. Nothing to taxing, no internet play.

The only really serious thing I do on here is my taxes, which is once a year, and when I'm done with that, the info gets transferred onto a zip drive and tossed into a lock box.

There are no movie files, music files, stuff like that. The only thing I'd really be heartbroken to lose would be several years worth of pictures, but most of the important ones have been burned onto a disk.
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
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