new pc n vista experience

[evershine]

just bought a new comp.. wondering why is IE 7 takes up so much cpu util when accessing gmail.  not sure about other website though. any help/comment or point me to a good website that can help improve sys performance would be great. thank u. oh window experience index.. graphics is 3.6. Abit sluggish.. but i guess can't be help... my card is really low end..

[evershine]

ok..manage to find solution for gmail issue.  just realised i cannot delete my posting/topic!   

[victor]

ok..manage to find solution for gmail issue.  just realised i cannot delete my posting/topic!   

woo...what PC you buy? my notebook is doing 4 for windows experience index....you need rams for vista. at least 3GB

[evershine]

Acer m1640, core 2 duo cpu e7200 4GB RAM, bottleneck is very likely to be the graphics card. Nvidia Geforce 8400 series seems to be the lowest end.. I thought it should be good enough.  What i did is continously scroll through a couple of photos of about 300kb each or scrolling through pdf files pages after pages, i see the thing pause and wait for loading. I tested a few low end system at the pcshow and some in Sim Lim and notice some can go through the photos without pausing. These are std photos that come with vista.  Should have paid more attention to graphics card instead of system ram.

[hwchoy]

a good system performance is a combination of most major components. don't ignore your disk performances also. if you have PCI drive cards for extra drives, make sure get good ones.

[Canew]

evershine, do allow me to ride on your thread. I was told at the PC Show that the 32-bit Windows Vista can only support till 3 GB RAM. I was inquiring on the Acer laptop. Is this true?

[victor]

This is true, I have 4GB of RAm, system recognise 4GB but can only use 3GB.

[evershine]

Canew - Mike told me and i myself verified.. the Vista SP1 resolved the issue of recognising 4GB max.  If you built your own system, it is better to have 2 or 4 GB instead of 3 if i am not wrong.  Some has dual channel so its better to have 2Gx2slots or 1Gx4 slots.

My first IBM compatible system was Datamini. After that i usually custom made. Acer pricing looks attractive and allow me to also choose what i want and don't want so i went for it.  The only thing is... i am too far behind the tech curve...

hwchoy, yes sir, i know that.. graphics turn out to be the bottleneck for my case.. too low end.

[Michael]

of course, mike is always right. 4gb ^_^ SP1 ^_^

and btw, my notebook's experience index is 4.6 =x

[victor]

Canew - Mike told me and i myself verified.. the Vista SP1 resolved the issue of recognising 4GB max.  If you built your own system, it is better to have 2 or 4 GB instead of 3 if i am not wrong.  Some has dual channel so its better to have 2Gx2slots or 1Gx4 slots.

My first IBM compatible system was Datamini. After that i usually custom made. Acer pricing looks attractive and allow me to also choose what i want and don't want so i went for it.  The only thing is... i am too far behind the tech curve...

hwchoy, yes sir, i know that.. graphics turn out to be the bottleneck for my case.. too low end.

SP1 only help recognise 4GB, but the system still can only use 3GB. Go to task Manager to verify.....

[Canew]

Thanks guys for all the feedback. Keep them coming... Can learn from the gurus here.

[Canew]

I now have another question: 'How important is the L2 cache?'

There was a model on sale at PC Show with 6MB L2 cache. How does this improve the system?

[victor]

Lets just say, I will trade 2GB of RAM for extra 4MB of L2 cache. L2 cache does pre-fetch of information for the CPU or i stores away frequently use data in the cache for faster access.

[evershine]

Vic, yup.. i realised about the utilizing up to 3GB part though i was not sure what i saw initially.    Your fren told me half the story...

I thought with 4GB and core2 duo it will definitely be very much faster than my old system with 512M and pentium IV running XP.  I am not complaining..(given another chance i would want to pay a bit more to get a sys near mid-end) its expected and reasonable.. since this is the low end entry level system cost less than 1K without monitor. 

My opinion regarding cache... i think it comes in handy if you do a lot of multitasking, video processing, and batch raw to jpeg conversion.  For editing of image, not much of a difference.

The sys is fast, can do a lot more, only slight annoying thing is the pause when scrolling through the pages of a huge pdf file.

1 thing i like about this sys - very cool n quiet and energy efficient - come in handy when oil price is so high....  
For more info about this cpu - http://hothardware.com/Articles/Intel_Core_2_Duo_E7200/?page=1

[Canew]

Lets just say, I will trade 2GB of RAM for extra 4MB of L2 cache. L2 cache does pre-fetch of information for the CPU or i stores away frequently use data in the cache for faster access.

Wow! you will trade 2GB or RAM for extra 4MB L2 cache? It is THAT important? 

The reason I am asking is because there were 2 laptops that were on sale at the recently concluded PC Show. See below: (copied from Acer leaflet)


Acer Aspire 5920G-812G25Mn. (@ $1798)
• Intel® Centrino® processor technology Intel® Core™2 Duo processor T8100
(2.1GHz, 800MHz FSB, 3MB L2 cache), supporting Intel® Extended Memory 64 Technology (Intel® EM64T) Intel® Wireless WiFi Link 4965AGN (dual-band quad mode 802.11a/b/g/ Draft-N) network connection.
• Genuine Microsoft® Windows Vista® Home Premium.
• Intel® 965PM Express chipset.
• nVidia® GeForce® 8600M GT with up to 1280MB of TurboCache™ (512MB of dedicated GDDR II VRAM, 768MB of shared system memory).
• 2GB DDR II RAM.
• 250GB S-ATA HDD.
• 15.4” WXGA Acer CrystalBrite™ colour TFT LCD.
• DVD-Super Multi Double-Layer Drive (DVD+/-RW).
• Built-in Bluetooth® 2.0+EDR.
• Integrated Acer CrystalEye 0.3 Megapixel webcam supporting enhanced Acer PrimaLite™ technology.
• Dolby® Home Theatre audio enhancement.
• Microsoft® Office 2007 60-Day Trial Preloaded.


Upgrade to Aspire 5920G-933G32Mn. (@ $2298)
• Intel® Core™2 Duo Processor T9300 (2.5GHz, 800MHz FSB, 6MB L2 cache).
• Genuine Microsoft® Windows Vista® Home Premium.
• 3GB DDR II RAM.
• 320GB S-ATA HDD.

I asked the promoter there what is the difference between the 2 models, he told me that there is a 6MB L2 cache, which I did not notice earlier after reading the leaflet. I asked if there were other brands that have 6MB L2 cache around. He replied that there is none with the exception of Apple notebooks which have 8MB L2 cache. That was also when I asked why Acer did not upgrade to 4GB RAM and the reply was the limitation imposed by the 32-bit Windows Vista.

IMO, the major difference between the 2 models is the CPU only. The additional of 1 GB RAM & 70GB HDD space is not expensive. But the difference in terms of pricing between the 2 models is a whopping $500! ($0.5k!)