Need some PC buying advice....

Hey Guys

I'm having trouble opening some larger photo files on my current laptop, which is a (POS) Acer 5749-6863. I bought it after the fire when I needed something quick and cheap. Now that I'm using my PC for work I'm finding it's too slow, especially when I have to edit photos in Photoshop that can be 500+ MB. I often have to reboot when it gets too slow and the overlays in Google Earth Pro take up to 10 seconds to load up (20-50MB photo overlays).

The Acer has an Intel Core i3-2330M and 3 GB DDR3 RAM so I'm guessing I'm being limited by the Intel HD Graphics 3000, but I wanted to confirm that before I spend any money. My PC is only about 8 months old and I don't have a lot on it and it only slows down when I'm doing heavy photo/Google Earth work. I have zero experience when it comes to graphics capabilities so any advice would be appreciated. Is the the most important thing the graphics card? The RAM? The chip?

This is a PC I was looking at:

http://www.frys.com/product/7057941?site=sa:Homepage Pod:Pod2

I'm assuming that anything with similar specs will be good enough for what I need. I have to have a notebook, unfortunately....

Thanks!

 

Eric, I run an i3 but have 8GB of ram and I can tell you it is very fast for photoshop and so on. It will boot PhotoShop in about 5 seconds or less. When I only had 2GB of RAM it took about 20 seconds. Get more RAM. It will really make a difference. Booting stuff like Microsoft Word takes less than a second. Basically, click and it's up and running.

 

Graphics is important for HD quality work, not necessarily Photoshop or Google Earth. I ran CS6 on a laptop with an ULV i5 and HD3000, and it was fine. The reason it ran well was because of the SSD drive (damn quick boot times) and the RAM amount (8GB)
However if you plan to do other things besides Photoshop and Google Earth then a good graphics chip is certainly worth putting some money into. It's also future proof, as the integrated gets old quickly, and may not have future support in certain applications.

The laptop you've picked out looks good to me- good brand, good specs too- the 640m is a good chip and certainly a step up from HD3000. It also have a good amount of VRAM but really that doesn't matter (unless you use an external monitor). CPU is also good, being the latest gen (best speed:heat ratio) and it's got a good 8GB of RAM.

 

I'll give the extra RAM a shot. Looks like I have to take off the entire underside of the PC which sucks....

 

The intel HD 3000 is pretty awesome for what it is. I guess it depends on what resolution you are using as anything above 720p / 1366x768, it will start to struggle under load.

3GB is kinda low TBH but as it is an odd number I'm assuming it is because you have 4GB installed but only 32 bit OS and some cannot be displayed because the cache and assignment used for other devices? In which case a RAM upgrade won't be the only thing you'd need, you'd need 64 bit OS too.

Don't forget laptops tend to have 5400 RPM HDD's which are coma slow too. You could slot in a 7200 RPMM HDD instead, or skip HDD altogether and go straight for an SSD, in which case an OCZ Agility 3 120GB will change your world.

 

That laptop you were looking at would be more than enough for your needs, the CPU is great and the GPU is decent, not quite the among the best mobile GPUs but it'll kick the crap out of any integrated one. Then again, even your current PC should be enough for that - I googled the specs, and you do have a 64-bit OS, so I'd go with the extra RAM too.

 

Before trying a whole new computer, try adding more RAM like everybody said.

 

I think the GPU is the limiting factor here. I had 4GB's of ram, a dual core and HD 3000 gfx and as soon as I dropped in a card (5770) the PC became much faster at Photoshop, Vegas and anything in general.

 

Well that's what happens when you go from integrated to dedicated- HD3000 is no longer stealing ram , and programs just work better on dedicated.

 

Some follow up information....

One thing I neglected to mention was that Google Earth Pro was having trouble showing very large overlays in DirectX mode. I had to switch to OpenGL. Does that change anything in terms of what I need to upgrade?

I downloaded CPU-Z and it says slot 1 has 2 GB PC3-10700 (667 MHz) and slot 3 has 1 GB PC3-10700 (667 MHz). I researched the specs on my PC and it says it can handle 8 GB of RAM. Any tips on decent brands? I'm seeing Crucial, Corsair, Samsung, Patriot, etc. The difference is price. I'm also seeing PC3-12800 MHz options.

Thanks!

 

To me this absolutely screams GPU...

 

IIRC OpenGL is a little more powerful that DirectX, right? Just not as popular.

Patriot is cheaper and I haven't had an issue with them. They did have an SSD firmware issue in the past, but what can you expect when you're saving money.
Don't buy "ValueSelect" from Corsair. That is just crap, and I see more dead ValueSelect sticks than any other brand. Crucial is OK but I can't say for certain because I've never bought from them
Samsung is pretty good but certainly not as popular as the other brands- you typically see them in OEM machines, not on the market. They've got good SSDs though.

The high speed the better, but just make sure the machine is capable of handling the higher speeds. Unlike desktops, most laptops don't underclock RAM to match the systems capabilities- it just won't boot.

 

Mushkin and Kingston are also good brands that you should consider. Just make sure what ever you buy comes with a decent warranty.

 

Intel integrated graphics shouldn't exist anymore. It puts so many laptops with a lot of potential to waste (except for the few with advanced docking stations). -_-

Even though the GPU is the machines largest bottleneck, you will definitely see a major performance increase by upgrading the RAM, and an SSD Drive would only increase that performance even more.

In addition to doing that, you could always consider some old-fashioned software optimization and memory management. If your laptop is still running the same OS that the OEM shipped out, there's a high chance that it might be pre-loaded with a bunch of unnecessary software that takes up useful memory.

Since graphics memory is also an important factor, I could imagine you seeing a significant performance increase from turning off Windows Aero (plus any additional hardware-accelerated effects) and/or closing Windows Explorer entirely and browsing Windows 3.1 style.

Any combination of the above would be an improvement for your laptop.

 

Thanks for all of the advice. I've just bought the RAM for $40, including delivery. Hopefully it will help somewhat.

24 screws later and the RAM is installed. Seeing some increase in speed, but still having some overlay issues. Still a no-go on the DirextX mode and overlays will not remove themselves after they have been unclicked until I move the cursor over the screen, which is how it was with 3 GB RAM. But Google Earth does appear to respond faster which is nice.

Overall I think this PC just has crappy display abilities, but I only spent $40 on the upgrade and there are other benefits. I'll sit tight for a year or so before I buy a new PC.

 

Now I have a vague felling that someone gonna disagree with me, but, if it's a laptop we're talking about, then get one with a smaller screen 'cause the thing with the regular sized laptops is that they take up more battery 'cause of a large screen(smaller screens equals less battery taken up).

 

Have you done a fresh install of windows? Open task manager if you have more than 60ish processes running, do a fresh instal and skip the bloatware... You can download the iso(legally) and make a USB boot disk(using MS provided software).

Modern intel integrated isn't 1/2 bad, they work for 90% of the people out there.

One thing to check is 64/32bit OS, if your laptop only came with 3gb, it may have only had 32bit windows installed, which has a cap of 3gb...


AKA moar research/info is required...

 

It's a 64-bit system.

One odd thing is that sometimes an open window that's been expanded to full screen will cover the taskbar at the bottom of the screen (windows 7) even though I have it locked into position. It won't completely cover it, it looks like it can't quite sort things out. In some areas it shows the taskbar, in other areas it shows the application window. As I move the mouse over the covered areas, the toolbar each section comes back into view as if I'm painting the toolbar with the cursor.

 

This is what I mean. I opened the Bookmarks tab and the toolbar gets covered....normal. But when I deselect the bookmarks tab the taskbar portion of the screen is still covered....but no where else. As I move my mouse over the taskbar it starts to show the buttons that I'm hovering over.

 

do you have the video card drivers installed correctly and 100% sure they're working?