With an i5 2430m and 8GB RAM, where will the bottleneck be?

[jjwagner66]

I have an ASUS U56E with 8GB ram and i5 2430m processor and I'm very happy with it, but just out of curiosity I'm wondering where my computer will tend to bottleneck and why. I know a lot of it depends on what you are doing. I just have the HD 3000 graphics card which I understand is pretty basic, but it does everything I want it to so I'm not worried about bottlenecking anywhere in that respect (I've also heard that with 8GB RAM the HD 3000 increases graphics memory to 512 MB. Anyone know if that is true?) More just the interplay between RAM and my processor. I run Windows 7 64-bit and I have noticed that with 8GB it is smoother and quicker than 4 or even 6 GB, so I'm happy with RAM. I'm assuming my processor will be the bottleneck for most things other than games or graphic intense programs where the bottleneck would undoubtedly be the GPU.

Can anyone tell me how my 2.4 ghz processor (which can turbo to 3.1, and does regularly) and my 8GB of RAM will interact with each other in regular useage? This may be a dumb question but I'm trying to learn. Even just saying this is a dumb question and I have no idea what I'm talking about would be helpful.

 

[Star72]

I do believe it depends on what you are doing & you will probably have to ask for specific tasks to get accurate replies.

 

[RetiredChief]

Have the I5-2410 (Samsung RF711-SO1).
8 Gigs is the seet spot (2 x 4 gig modules) as this will operate in daul changle mode. My laoptop came with a single 4 gig Ram module and was running is single chanel mode. You only have two option for running in dual channel mode - 2 x 2 gig modules, or 2 x 4 gig modules. 6 gigs will drop you back to single channel.

You do not have a HD3000 card, The HD3000 IGP is inside the CPU chip. Very little you can do to improve it, Single vs daul channel mode will also effect IGP performance.

The biggest bottlenect on your system is the Slow HDD.
What I did was to swap out the HDD for a SSD. Very good performance boost in terms of loading the operating system and loading programs (NOTE programs will not run faster with an SSD. The biggest single draw back is there are small compared to a HDD. A 128 gig SSD (ie curcial M4 or a samsung 830) will set you back $200 give or take $20.
Most laptops come with a 320 gig -> 750 gig HDD, much larger than an SSD.

Luckily my Samsung Has two HDD bays, so I can put a 128 gig SSD for operating system and the orginal HDD I moved over to the 2nd Bay and use it to store all my data.

My older laptop. Swapped out the HDD for a 128 gig SSD and put the HDD in a USB enclouser and use for my data that I do not need on a regular basis.

As to bottlenecks and performance - You bought it so ENJOY it and hopefully you will not have (SEE) any bottlenecks (outside HDD performance). The only "slow" performance that I've noted was in putting a DVD (or Blu-ray) video on it and then running a encodiding program to reduce it to mpeg4 (720P) for playback on my Ipad (takes about a hour to convert a DVD movie (4->6 gigs) to a 2 Gig 720P mpeg4).

 

[jjwagner66]

I do believe it depends on what you are doing & you will probably have to ask for specific tasks to get accurate replies.

You mean you can't magically see into the future and see exactly what I will be doing with my computer? I thought you guys were the experts.

Good call. Sorry. Um basically just home and office type activities. Nothing honestly I can think of that would be very demanding other than having Windows 2010 open and Google Chrome open...at the same time. No small feat in comparison to previous systems.

 

[jjwagner66]

Have the I5-2410 (Samsung RF711-SO1).
8 Gigs is the seet spot (2 x 4 gig modules) as this will operate in daul changle mode. My laoptop came with a single 4 gig Ram module and was running is single chanel mode. You only have two option for running in dual channel mode - 2 x 2 gig modules, or 2 x 4 gig modules. 6 gigs will drop you back to single channel.

You do not have a HD3000 card, The HD3000 IGP is inside the CPU chip. Very little you can do to improve it, Single vs daul channel mode will also effect IGP performance.

The biggest bottlenect on your system is the Slow HDD.
What I did was to swap out the HDD for a SSD. Very good performance boost in terms of loading the operating system and loading programs (NOTE programs will not run faster with an SSD. The biggest single draw back is there are small compared to a HDD. A 128 gig SSD (ie curcial M4 or a samsung 830) will set you back $200 give or take $20.
Most laptops come with a 320 gig -> 750 gig HDD, much larger than an SSD.

Luckily my Samsung Has two HDD bays, so I can put a 128 gig SSD for operating system and the orginal HDD I moved over to the 2nd Bay and use it to store all my data.

My older laptop. Swapped out the HDD for a 128 gig SSD and put the HDD in a USB enclouser and use for my data that I do not need on a regular basis.

As to bottlenecks and performance - You bought it so ENJOY it and hopefully you will not have (SEE) any bottlenecks (outside HDD performance). The only "slow" performance that I've noted was in putting a DVD (or Blu-ray) video on it and then running a encodiding program to reduce it to mpeg4 (720P) for playback on my Ipad (takes about a hour to convert a DVD movie (4->6 gigs) to a 2 Gig 720P mpeg4).

Thanks for the reply. I'm curious what you mean by dual vs single channel mode? Do I have to do something manually to make that happen? And I'm not sure what my RAM setup is. I just bought the laptop and it says it comes with 8GB RAM. I'm not sure how it is arranged inside the computer.

The biggest bottlenect on your system is the Slow HDD.

Hm. That is helpful to know. Is installing SDD difficult?

I went to Accessories > System Tools > System Information > Storage > Drives and I believe my HDD is 279.45 GB for my C drive. Is that the size of my HDD? That seems pretty small. Guess that would be the bottleneck for most things.

 

[jjwagner66]

your HDD is not small for a notebook even though they make bigger ones.
your using the term bottleneck too loosely (and incorrectly) because in all honesty besides your HDD running @ 5400 or 7200RPM your HD 3000 is fine.
are you're trying to run games at full resolution on the notebook then, you'll have a 'bottleneck' with the HD 3000 but that's about it.

to sum it up, if not gaming then upgrade your HDD to SSD and that's about it.

That sounds like very sound advice. You are right I think the HD3000 will be more than enough for my needs. I've been reading and as I understand the HDD is by far the slowest part of the computer. I'd hate to have all that wonderful processing power and 8GB RAM limited by a small harddrive. So I'll look into SSD but other than that I think I'm good.

 

[jjwagner66]

yes you really are, that's a good solid notebook / mobile workstation (almost).

Almost....

?

 

[jjwagner66]

Ahhhaha yeah I understand what I'm doing is pretty modest. I almost got an i7 then backed down because it was all about ego rather than reality haha. I don't need that thing.

Should I get a crucial 64GB SSD?

 

[jjwagner66]

Okay 120 sounds good. And they are reasonably priced. What is the best brand?

And I think I might have a two partition drive...

 

[jjwagner66]

Update: I have a 750GB harddrive according to PCMAgazine:

"Sweetening the deal here are the system's 8GB of RAM and 750GB hard drive, which respectively grant you performance efficiency and more space for storing files and installing programs."

Is that combining the C drive and D drive together or something?

 

[jjwagner66]

Yeah I'm trying to find a site that gives every possible spec.

 

[jjwagner66]

Found it:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2395705,00.asp?tab=Specs

Spec Data
Type General Purpose, Value
Processor Name Intel Core i5-2430M
Operating System Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium
Processor Speed 2.4 GHz
RAM 8 GB
Screen Size 15.6 inches
Screen Size Type Widescreen
Native Resolution 1366 x 768
Graphics Card Intel HD Graphics 3000
Storage Capacity (as Tested) 750 GB
Rotation Speed 5400 rpm
Networking Options 802.11n
Primary Optical Drive DVD+/-RW (Plus Minus)
Wireless Display Capability (WiDi) Yes
WiMax No
Battery Type 74 Whr (Watt hours)
MobileMark 2007 – Standard Battery Productivity Load (hrs:min) 6:30
PCMark7 2285
3-D BENCHMARK TESTS - 3DMark06 - 1,024 x 768 - Default 5120
3-D BENCHMARK TESTS - 3DMark06 - Native – 0X/4X 4211
Crysis - Medium quality - 1,024 x 768 - AA/AF=Off/Off 13.1
Lost Planet 2 (DX9) - Middle quality - 1,024 x 768- AA/AF=Off/Off 20.2
MULTIMEDIA TESTS - Handbrake 1:50 min:sec
MULTIMEDIA TESTS - PhotoShop CS5 4:02 min:sec
MULTIMEDIA TESTS - CineBench 11.5 2.68

Benchmarks
MULTIMEDIA TESTS - CineBench 11.5 2.68
MULTIMEDIA TESTS - Handbrake 1:50
PCMark7 2285
Lost Planet 2 (DX9) - Middle quality - 1,024 x 768- AA/AF=Off/Off 20.2
Crysis - Medium quality - 1,024 x 768 - AA/AF=Off/Off 13.1
MULTIMEDIA TESTS - PhotoShop CS5 4:02
3-D BENCHMARK TESTS - 3DMark06 - 1,024 x 768 - Default 5120
MobileMark 2007 – Standard Battery Productivity Load (hrs:min) 6:30
3-D BENCHMARK TESTS - 3DMark06 - Native – 0X/4X 4211

 

[jjwagner66]

I don't knwo if that says how many HHD I have or if my hard drive is one or two partitions.

Here is what I looked up earlier:

"Drive C:
Description Local Fixed Disk
Compressed No
File System NTFS
Size 279.45 GB (300,061,552,640 bytes)
Free Space 231.34 GB (248,397,754,368 bytes)
Volume Name OS
Volume Serial Number 2484EBDD

Drive D:
Description Local Fixed Disk
Compressed No
File System NTFS
Size 394.18 GB (423,247,212,544 bytes)
Free Space 394.08 GB (423,139,659,776 bytes)
Volume Name DATA
Volume Serial Number 4076B66B

Drive E:
Description CD-ROM Disc"

 

[jjwagner66]

Okay so 5400 can def. be improved. How do I know if I have two or more HHD? And what does it matter if my HHD is one or more partitions?

I found this under "disks"

"Description Disk drive
Manufacturer (Standard disk drives)
Model ST9750423AS
Bytes/Sector 512
Media Loaded Yes
Media Type Fixed hard disk
Partitions 3
SCSI Bus 0
SCSI Logical Unit 0
SCSI Port 0
SCSI Target ID 0
Sectors/Track 63
Size 698.64 GB (750,153,761,280 bytes)
Total Cylinders 91,201
Total Sectors 1,465,144,065
Total Tracks 23,256,255
Tracks/Cylinder 255
Partition Disk #0, Partition #0
Partition Size 25.00 GB (26,843,545,600 bytes)
Partition Starting Offset 1,048,576 bytes
Partition Disk #0, Partition #1
Partition Size 279.45 GB (300,061,556,736 bytes)
Partition Starting Offset 26,844,594,176 bytes
Partition Disk #0, Partition #2
Partition Size 394.18 GB (423,248,265,216 bytes)
Partition Starting Offset 326,906,150,912 bytes"

I think that means I have two partitions.

 

[jjwagner66]

one HDD that's 750GB.
not if it's partitioned, probably at least once maybe twice..

So does that mean ditch any ideas about an SSD?

 

[jjwagner66]

Oh okay I thought having multiple partitions was a problem. Okay so what brand name is best? And I can just unscrew my computer and pop it in myself?

 

[jjwagner66]

I'll spend around $200 max...but I wouldn't mind spending less.

 

[jjwagner66]

What is the difference?

 

[jjwagner66]

K.

Woah shell shocker is cheap. Why so?

 

[jjwagner66]

I'll probably go with the pricier one to feel safe.

 

[jjwagner66]

The only thing on my computer I'm insecure about now is my processor. i5 2430 can go to 3ghz when turbo charged or whatever. Is 3 ghz enough for most things? If I have Windows 7 64-bit and 8GB ram plus a 128 SSD probably my processor will be my main limitation. What would I need more than 3.0-3.1 ghz of processing power for? Because I guess that will be the thing I can't do ha.

 

[RetiredChief]

He has a SB notebook, should be Sata III, but not positive, but in either case would recommend the SATA III SSD, Currently the Curcial M4 is (was) on sale for $180. Just got my new samsung 830 which was $ 220 I also have 2 of the M4's in my samsung laptop (has 2 HDD bays). And my recommendation on SSDs - either the curcial M4 or the Samesung 830

On SSD installation:
Not dificault, but would have to re-install operating system. This will depend on type of DVD they gave you. If it is a full instalation version no problem.

One - you would need to go into the bios and verify that ahci is enabled.
Two Install windows just like it was a HDD.
three Once windows is installed, go to intel and download the latest intel RST drive (they are now up to 10.8 and install.
Other than installing programs your down.

PS - For what you do NO BOTTLENECK. HD3000 is plenty until you get into gaming.
The SSD will ONLY speed up booting the laoptop, opening programs, Slight savings on battery, also my reduce the possibility of damaging the HDD when jarred - Had one laptop fall off the convayer belt at airport number of years ago- It's 5 or 6 yrs old and STILL using it at work - Only to connect to a windows 3.11 computer.

ADDED: see several additional posts.
Glad you are looking at the M4 - DO NOT get the Agillity IIIs (Have two of them also)
For what you indicated - your CPU is fast enough. The biggest diff between the i5 and the I7 is the number of cores. And you are not running programs that will require high core counts. As I indicated you would only see a cpu problem if you did a lot of video encoding.

 

[jjwagner66]

dude seriously...?
just grab the SSD and roll on.
it's obvious you have deep pockets and little to worry about.

I need to have utter intellectual mastery of everything I do. It's a psychological compulsion.

I do appreciate all your help!

 

[jjwagner66]

He has a SB notebook, should be Sata III, but not positive, but in either case would recommend the SATA III SSD, Currently the Curcial M4 is (was) on sale for $180. Just got my new samsung 830 which was $ 220 I also have 2 of the M4's in my samsung laptop (has 2 HDD bays). And my recommendation on SSDs - either the curcial M4 or the Samesung 830

On SSD installation:
Not dificault, but would have to re-install operating system. This will depend on type of DVD they gave you. If it is a full instalation version no problem.

One - you would need to go into the bios and verify that ahci is enabled.
Two Install windows just like it was a HDD.
three Once windows is installed, go to intel and download the latest intel RST drive (they are now up to 10.8 and install.
Other than installing programs your down.

PS - For what you do NO BOTTLENECK. HD3000 is plenty until you get into gaming.
The SSD will ONLY speed up booting the laoptop, opening programs, Slight savings on battery, also my reduce the possibility of damaging the HDD when jarred - Had one laptop fall off the convayer belt at airport number of years ago- It's 5 or 6 yrs old and STILL using it at work - Only to connect to a windows 3.11 computer.

Will SSD work in tangent with my RAM and processor? Or does it do it's own thing for the most part?

 

[jjwagner66]

Sounds worth it to me.

So my final set up:

Asus U56E-RBL8

64-bit Windows 7

8GB RAM

i5 2430m

Intel HD3000

128GB SATA III SSD


I think I'm covered?