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Pentium M questions

M

mayakindaguy

Gawd
Joined
Jan 28, 2004
Messages
538
Well, I recently got a new lappy from Dell. The specs are:

cpu-1.6 Pentium M 533FSB

RAM-2x512 DDR 2 400mhz

VGA-ATI Radeon Mobile X300 128MB

I was just wondering whether this is the correct RAM for this cpu. It's Dell RAM and DDR2 so I'm thinking the timings are very slow like cas 4 or something.

I was also wondering whether this config should become unresponsive. I was just messing around with it and when playing a quicktime file like watching a trailer off of apple.com the taskmanager says it's eating up like an average of 60% of the cpu! and when I minimize the window while playing the video still, the cpu usage jumps up to like 100% and the system is completely bogged down and unresponsive. I tried comparing it to a friend's lappy with the same cpu, but only 512 RAM and onboard graphics and quicktime only takes up like 20% cpu usage and it does spike when minimized, but only to like 40% or something.

This is a brand new lappy and there isn't spyware on it or anything, wel at least not according to the spyware programs. But anyways, I was just wondering what was going on and if this was normal because I thought that this system would be pretty smooth for most tasks, except for obviously things like crazy video encoding, photo work or video editing etc.

Thanks
 
that what I thought right? aren't I just crippling the cpu with DDR 400 memory? Because if it's 533FSB then I should have the 533 RAM right? DDR 400 is for a 200mhz FSB I thought? But why the hell would Dell configure you system with crippled memory!
 
Because the performance difference is pretty much negligable. One of the first things you should learn is that theoretical performance projections hardly tell the actual story about the performance of any system.
 
but should a 1.6 Pentium M with those specs become that unresponsive as described above? To me it doesn't seem like it's performing much better than my old PIII 800mhz. I guess I will have to play with it some more.
 
mayakindaguy said:
but should a 1.6 Pentium M with those specs become that unresponsive as described above? To me it doesn't seem like it's performing much better than my old PIII 800mhz. I guess I will have to play with it some more.
Click to expand...

It should be a pretty snappy little system. Are you sure it isnt throttling by watching the volts and speed in CPU-Z?
 
One thing I notice is that for DivX playing, the "auto" setting even at maximum on my M200 will make the video play stutteringly. My guess is that some parts of the stream are easier to decode than others, but it has to wait to throttle up when it bites off more than it can chew. Setting the CPU to "fixed" at less than maximum clears this up.

Poke around in your power settings and look for stuff about CPU performance.
 
Yeah, after testing it out with CPU-Z it's generally throttling at 800mhz at about 50% cpu usage, and spike to 1.6 at 100%.

Are the settings to control the throttling a windows feature, BIOS feature or do I need another program to contol this? There is a DELL quickset feature, but when you set it to maximum it just keeps your screen bright and sets it so that your HDD doesn't turn off when idle. It doesn't seem to affect throttling at all.
 
ddr2 400 is made for cpus with 200fbs, your pm has a fsb of 133, so you need ddr2 333, but ddr2 doesnt come lower than 400. You guys crack me up, ddr=double data rate so ddr400 is 200 ddr400 is also pc3200, and ddr2 400 is pc2-3200, i mean come on.
 
SIN0822 said:
ddr2 400 is made for cpus with 200fbs, your pm has a fsb of 133, so you need ddr2 333, but ddr2 doesnt come lower than 400. You guys crack me up, ddr=double data rate so ddr400 is 200 ddr400 is also pc3200, and ddr2 400 is pc2-3200, i mean come on.
Click to expand...
rolleyes.gif
 
SIN0822 said:
ddr2 400 is made for cpus with 200fbs, your pm has a fsb of 133, so you need ddr2 333, but ddr2 doesnt come lower than 400. You guys crack me up, ddr=double data rate so ddr400 is 200 ddr400 is also pc3200, and ddr2 400 is pc2-3200, i mean come on.
Click to expand...

Eh, I know all that. It was just a misconception about DDR2 that I had.
DDR2-533 technically runs at 133x4. But the bus is actually 266x2. So yeah, DDR2-400 would still be "suffice." If he had a decent bios in that system he'd be able to set the divider to 1:1, but I'm sure the dell wouldn't allow it.
 
I agree that the memory should be good enough, the system is only a 1.6 GHz anyway.

Other than that, I'd like to ask... is it even possible to replace memory in a laptop? I'm not familiar with this particular one, but last time I saw a laptop's inside, everything was soldered onto the mainboard, to save space.
You could add memory, but not replace it.

edit and quite offtopic:
Why DDR2 will be a good thing for AMD: http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1027617398&postcount=16
Click to expand...

Isn't it funny that AMD-people downplay DDR2 completely, until AMD announces that it will support it? Now suddenly it seems like the best thing since sliced bread!
 
Scali said:
I agree that the memory should be good enough, the system is only a 1.6 GHz anyway.

Other than that, I'd like to ask... is it even possible to replace memory in a laptop? I'm not familiar with this particular one, but last time I saw a laptop's inside, everything was soldered onto the mainboard, to save space.
You could add memory, but not replace it.

edit and quite offtopic:


Isn't it funny that AMD-people downplay DDR2 completely, until AMD announces that it will support it? Now suddenly it seems like the best thing since sliced bread!
Click to expand...

Depends on the laptop but many are upgradable, you've probably seen SO-DIMM sticks.
 
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