please help the grossly impatient.

[fuscia]

as it turns out, all i appear to care about is 'speeeeeeeeeeeed'. so here's what i want to know: which element of a computer is most crucial, in that regard (cpu, fsb, memory, typing skill, internet connection, etc.)? which os opens apps fastest? which os works fastest for things like internet, e-mail and whatever the other thing was that i was thinking about? are there any speed things i haven't tried (is there any point in overclocking a celeron processor?)? there's probably going to be suggestions i've already tried, but if someone comes up with one i haven't, i will be high off it for at least a week. plus, i'm sure there are those who have yet to enter the beautiful world of intolerant waiting releaved.

[goatflyer]

1) RAM
2) High Speed Internet

then if you are into games:
3) CPU & Video Card

Did I mention that BIG programs eat a lot of hard disk space?

[mstlyevil]

as it turns out, all i appear to care about is 'speeeeeeeeeeeed'. so here's what i want to know: which element of a computer is most crucial, in that regard (cpu, fsb, memory, typing skill, internet connection, etc.)? which os opens apps fastest? which os works fastest for things like internet, e-mail and whatever the other thing was that i was thinking about? are there any speed things i haven't tried (is there any point in overclocking a celeron processor?)? there's probably going to be suggestions i've already tried, but if someone comes up with one i haven't, i will be high off it for at least a week. plus, i'm sure there are those who have yet to enter the beautiful world of intolerant waiting releaved.

Overall the CPU and chipset are the biggest determining factors to speed. Memory, GPU and the Hard Drive all are almost as important. The CPU is the most important because it is what becomes the bottlekneck of the system especially with Intels FSB. (AMD uses Hypertransport Bus instead of FSB.) What makes a AMD system so much faster than Intel is the memory controller is on die with the CPU eliminating the middleman between the memory and the CPU. HTB on AMD runs at the processor clockspeed where FSB on Intel runs at 1/4 to 1/5 the CPU clockspeed creating a bottle kneck. Also AMD can communicate between the CPU and memory in both directions at the same time where Intel can only communicate one way at a time.

The other things are very important to overall speed but you must always start with the right CPU and MOBO chipset first.

[Iandefor]

CPU and RAM. RAM is more important, but CPU can also be a bottleneck.

With the WM's you tend to use, however, I don't think you'd need a super-powerful computer. Ratpoison on 2 GB of RAM and an Athlon X2? No point.

[mstlyevil]

CPU and RAM. RAM is more important, but CPU can also be a bottleneck.

With the WM's you tend to use, however, I don't think you'd need a super-powerful computer. Ratpoison on 2 GB of RAM and an Athlon X2? No point.

I have to disagree with this because a AMD CPU causes DDR1 RAM to outperform DDR2 RAM on an Intel system. The CPU is by far the most important.

As far as fast internet. It is most important only if the speed you are talking about is how fast you can download and view web pages. All the other options affect total system speed.

[Iandefor]

I have to disagree with this because a AMD CPU causes DDR1 RAM to outperform DDR2 RAM on an Intel system. The CPU is by far the most important. I disagree ;), but I've not the heart to discuss it, unfortunately. We'll disagree here, ne?

[mstlyevil]

I disagree ;), but I've not the heart to discuss it, unfortunately. We'll disagree here, ne?

I have no problem with a healthy disagreement. :mrgreen: It would be a boring world if we all agreed on everything.

[Iandefor]

I have no problem with a healthy disagreement. :mrgreen: It would be a boring world if we all agreed on everything. It would be!

[poofyhairguy]

RAM!!!! Its most important for OS speed until you get around a gig. Then CPU matters more.

But really, if you have 512mb or less......GET MORE RAM!

[poofyhairguy]

I have to disagree with this because a AMD CPU causes DDR1 RAM to outperform DDR2 RAM on an Intel system. The CPU is by far the most important.


Thats a funny way to look at it.

A 2ghz machine with a gig of RAM will run Ubuntu better than a dual core system with 256mb of RAM. RAM is far more important in the modern age.

I saved an old iBook by feeding it RAM.

[mstlyevil]

RAM!!!! Its most important for OS speed until you get around a gig. Then CPU matters more.

But really, if you have 512mb or less......GET MORE RAM!

I can agree with this. I have a gig of patriot RAM with timings of 2-3-2-5. This Athlon 64 3200 blows away my old Athlon XP 2500 with a gig of RAM.

[mstlyevil]

Thats a funny way to look at it.

A 2ghz machine with a gig of RAM will run Ubuntu better than a dual core system with 256mb of RAM. RAM is far more important in the modern age.

I saved an old iBook by feeding it RAM.

True dat. But if you run CPU intensive applications both matter equally.

[Virogenesis]

I'd say either ram or cpu.
Dual channel ram is ace you'll certainly notice the difference.
Dual channel is basicaly where you have two sticks of ram which match as they are a matching pair they can be used as one stick increasing speed.
Dual channel is only supported by socket 939 boards.
Socket 754 can't be run in dual channel, Socket a can run in dual channel but isn't that fast I think it only uses like 55% of what it should.
A nice L1 and L2 cache on a cpu helps alot once again.
You'll notice even when runnning dual channel ram and a new cpu you'll then get a bottleneck with the harddrive even with sata 2 you'll have a bottle neck of somekind.
DVD drives aren't fast enough you'll occur a bottle neck their aswell.
When looking for a harddrive try to get one with a large cache when copying large files you'll notice a difference.
Scsi is still faster than ide and sata so for those that are just pure speed monkeys booting up off of scsi would improve.
You can also get sata to compact flash thats pretty neat.

But yeah either cpu or ram in most cases....more ram means less time reading the hard drive

[WildTangent]

Hard drive is the slowest component in your system. Short of spending thousands on a RAMdisk, or hundreds on a 15k RPM SCSI drive, you can get a 10k RPM Western Digital Raptor. It uses SATA, and they have a new model out that holds 150GB.

-Wild

[Virogenesis]

a 64 bit cpu allows up to 4GB in system ram by having that much system ram you'll take away the need for a swap file meaning you won't experience a slow down because of the harddrive.
Now I've just been looking running compact flash as a ramdrive but the write/read speeds are poor like 20mb a sec and another downside is they have a limited lifecycle.
But yeah these days we don't require the need for a swap file so if you can get rid of it and use system. :)

[Lanrond]

I think it depends on what you do with your computer.
If you use it as an average home computer (web, typing, audio, ecc...) I would say RAM is crucial. If you are the always online type, connection speed is what you care about. If you manage databases, HD access speed matters the most. If you work with image manipulation, CPU is the bottleneck.
So I don't think there is just one answer to your question. :-)

[fuscia]

(whoa...i need this thread translated.) anyway, i mostly just use browsers. i check my e-mail, but my correspondence is just the usual "how's everybody on your end?" type stuff. the app i use most, besides the typical end user junk, is gimp. i use it for editing photos, making wallpapers, silly junk, etc. i certainly don't use it for anything super intense and i don't use it as often as i used to. the only game i play is dope wars on my palm v. the closest thing i would call multitasking, that i do, would be having a browser open (these days, opera would be the heaviest i'd be using. i love firefox, but it just got too sluggish compared to opera and dillo) while using gimp to put some silly thing together to post and having xmms playing some shoutcast station. (one could also include an instance of sylpheed-claws left open on a long forgotten workspace.) there have been a couple of times when i had gimp and synaptic open at the same time and that caused a near halt, but i can't even remember why i had both open at the same time, nor can i think of a reason to. as someone kindly noted, the wms i use are pretty slim.

i have a 700mhz celeron with 256 ram. if i remember correctly, my fsb is something like 68megasomething and my L2 cache (wtf? i don't even know what L2 cache is)...so, i'm hoping to get a laptop in the not too distant future and i'm hoping that whatever i get will be zippier than what i have now. i can do all the stuff i do now, perfectly well, with my current machine, but as i said, i'm very impatient.

i was reading about some speed record set by netbsd - http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/05/03/2235255&tid=95
is that something that even remotely translates into real life, or is that something i should just say to "that's nice. who cares?"

[mstlyevil]

(whoa...i need this thread translated.) anyway, i mostly just use browsers. i check my e-mail, but my correspondence is just the usual "how's everybody on your end?" type stuff. the app i use most, besides the typical end user junk, is gimp. i use it for editing photos, making wallpapers, silly junk, etc. i certainly don't use it for anything super intense and i don't use it as often as i used to. the only game i play is dope wars on my palm v. the closest thing i would call multitasking, that i do, would be having a browser open (these days, opera would be the heaviest i'd be using. i love firefox, but it just got too sluggish compared to opera and dillo) while using gimp to put some silly thing together to post and having xmms playing some shoutcast station. (one could also include an instance of sylpheed-claws left open on a long forgotten workspace.) there have been a couple of times when i had gimp and synaptic open at the same time and that caused a near halt, but i can't even remember why i had both open at the same time, nor can i think of a reason to. as someone kindly noted, the wms i use are pretty slim.

i have a 700mhz celeron with 256 ram. if i remember correctly, my fsb is something like 68megasomething and my L2 cache (wtf? i don't even know what L2 cache is)...so, i'm hoping to get a laptop in the not too distant future and i'm hoping that whatever i get will be zippier than what i have now. i can do all the stuff i do now, perfectly well, with my current machine, but as i said, i'm very impatient.

i was reading about some speed record set by netbsd - http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/05/03/2235255&tid=95
is that something that even remotely translates into real life, or is that something i should just say to "that's nice. who cares?"

I can guarantee you a new laptop would certainly be faster than a 700 mhz Celeron. If you want to speed up that old computer, get at least another 256 MB of RAM. When buying your lappy, If you are going for a desktop replacement that you will only be taking with you occasionally then get a AMD Athlon 64 mobile laptop. If you want one to take everywhere and battery life and performance both matter then get a Intel Pentium M lappy. No matter which one you decide to buy, make sure it has at least 512 MB of RAM. If you can swing it get 1 gig of RAM because you will be happier in the long run.

[Lanrond]

...i have a 700mhz celeron with 256 ram...

More ram would surely be useful...

[fuscia]

I can guarantee you a new laptop would certainly be faster than a 700 mhz Celeron. If you want to speed up that old computer, get at least another 256 MB of RAM. When buying your lappy, If you are going for a desktop replacement that you will only be taking with you occasionally then get a AMD Athlon 64 mobile laptop. If you want one to take everywhere and battery life and performance both matter then get a Intel Pentium M lappy. No matter which one you decide to buy, make sure it has at least 512 MB of RAM. If you can swing it get 1 gig of RAM because you will be happier in the long run.

thanks, i was guessing that anything i'd get now would be faster. i have noticed that AMD laptops seem more zippy to me. unfortunately, budget plays a big roll in this. i was looking at a dell inspiron b120 with a 1.4celeron with 512ram and the same speed disk i have now. i'm guessing that would still be faster than my current machine.

i have a 512ram chip sitting on my desk. it doesn't fit in my machine. the memory i have in there is dimm memory, but it has two slits in it, rather than just one.

[mstlyevil]

thanks, i was guessing that anything i'd get now would be faster. i have noticed that AMD laptops seem more zippy to me. unfortunately, budget plays a big roll in this. i was looking at a dell inspiron b120 with a 1.4celeron with 512ram and the same speed disk i have now. i'm guessing that would still be faster than my current machine.

i have a 512ram chip sitting on my desk. it doesn't fit in my machine. the memory i have in there is dimm memory, but it has two slits in it, rather than just one.

Try pricing a HP or a Gateway with a AMD processor and you might be surprised to find out it may be cheaper or comparible to go with AMD. Look at as many companies and configurations as you can before you make a decision to buy. Even a Sempron lappy would be better than a Celeron lappy if you can swing it. But if at the end of the day all you can afford is the Celeron lappy, then that still will be a nice upgrade.

That old computer probally takes PC 100 memory. I am only guessing of course but todays memory will not fit. Go to www.crucial.com and they have a tool that may help you determine what memory you have. You may have to find it at a online computer store or E-bay to buy it.

[fuscia]

Try pricing a HP or a Gateway with a AMD processor and you might be surprised to find out it may be cheaper or comparible to go with AMD. Look at as many companies and configurations as you can before you make a decision to buy. Even a Sempron lappy would be better than a Celeron lappy if you can swing it. But if at the end of the day all you can afford is the Celeron lappy, then that still will be a nice upgrade.

the $500 range still has the dell out in front. a lot of the candidates i've looked at, that would seem reasonably affordable, have 4200rpm disks which would be a downgrade. at least on the dell, with the same speed disk, everything else is an upgrade, especially the fsb (400 vs. 68).


That old computer probally takes PC 100 memory. I am only guessing of course but todays memory will not fit. Go to www.crucial.com and they have a tool that may help you determine what memory you have. You may have to find it at a online computer store or E-bay to buy it.

pc133 is what it came with. unfortunately, crucial won't scan a linux box (no windows here). in the meantime, i will have to work on my patience. yuk!

thanks, btw.

[mstlyevil]

the $500 range still has the dell out in front. a lot of the candidates i've looked at, that would seem reasonably affordable, have 4200rpm disks which would be a downgrade. at least on the dell, with the same speed disk, everything else is an upgrade, especially the fsb (400 vs. 68).



pc133 is what it came with. unfortunately, crucial won't scan a linux box (no windows here). in the meantime, i will have to work on my patience. yuk!

thanks, btw.

Oh no, you do not have to have nothing scanned. You just enter in the manufactuer, model and model number and they will tell you. PC 133 sounds about right for those specs. My brothers 4 year old Gateway has PC 133.

[fuscia]

Oh no, you do not have to have nothing scanned. You just enter in the manufactuer, model and model number and they will tell you. PC 133 sounds about right for those specs. My brothers 4 year old Gateway has PC 133.

ooooooooooooooh, i get it. thanks.