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Cadillac Forums: Got a new computer....laptop, vista....
My new Acer laptop runs Vista fine. It has an AMD Athlon 64 X2 with 1gb DDR2 RAM. I plan on bumping it up to 4Gb with 2 soDIMM modules.
Yeah, we've got the same processor, whats yours run at? Mine is a 1.8ghz.
I'm jealous though you can expand to 4gb, apparently mine is only 2, which stinks... but... ah well.
This thing still kicks butt and I can't get enough of it... great laptop!
__________________ ~ Rick
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~1994 Isuzu Amigo - Everything but roadtrips (unless trailer is in tow)
~1996 Lincoln Town Car Signature Series - The roadtrip machine AKA "Mafia Mobile"
Yeah, we've got the same processor, whats yours run at? Mine is a 1.8ghz.
I'm jealous though you can expand to 4gb, apparently mine is only 2, which stinks... but... ah well.
This thing still kicks butt and I can't get enough of it... great laptop!
Mine says it runs at 1.7ghz. Double check your capacity in your manual. The Acers come with 1 or 2Gb but can be upgraded to 4, yours should be similar.
Two points of advice:
No Vista unless you get an absolute top-end machine.
No Laptop as a primary machine. It will be dead inside two years, especially if left on 24/7.
Corrolary: No vista on a laptop -any laptop. They cannot take the performance hit.
I reccomend Dell and Apple -gotta go American made. Both will run XP these days.
Oh come on now. Those are some far fetched statements. I have been using this very Compaq laptop right now for 3 years and I leave it running 24/7. I put Vista on it about a month ago and it is lightning fast. It's a 1.3ghz celeron, and I have uprgraded the ram to 1GB. I use this as my primary while I have a darned fast desktop just sitting there.
I also can't believe you go from recommending a Dell to an Apple. Apple should be left to only run OSX. Granted, there is bootcamp. But really you can get the very same equipment at a MUCH cheaper price.
I think that majority of people who bash Vista have not actually used it. They just jump the bandwagon and go with the flow.
Mine says it runs at 1.7ghz. Double check your capacity in your manual. The Acers come with 1 or 2Gb but can be upgraded to 4, yours should be similar.
When I go to system info it says 1.80ghz.
On the circuit city tech data page it says 1gb included expandable to 2gb.... I'd like to find out for sure.... I just installed the Norton antivirus and installed 43 updates.... it is slower starting up now and according to the meter thing right now between 83-90% of the memory is being used and when the processor useage used to sit around 3-6% while typing the posts its now 15-30% and spikes..... I am starting to think that Norton antivirus is really bogging the computer.... unless it was the windows updates? I dunno I am going to try running with the Norton disabled and see how it fares.
I bought myself a macbook last night and I'm in heaven. I have vista on my overkill desktop but I needed a new laptop, and the mac had everthing I wanted, plus more. I had a $250 gift card from my birthday so it was ~1300 out the door. I'm going to upgrade the ram myself, save $100. The only thing they were out of was the adapter to output to S-video. I hope you're as happy as I am.
On the circuit city tech data page it says 1gb included expandable to 2gb.... I'd like to find out for sure.... I just installed the Norton antivirus and installed 43 updates.... it is slower starting up now and according to the meter thing right now between 83-90% of the memory is being used and when the processor useage used to sit around 3-6% while typing the posts its now 15-30% and spikes..... I am starting to think that Norton antivirus is really bogging the computer.... unless it was the windows updates? I dunno I am going to try running with the Norton disabled and see how it fares.
You wouldn't believe how nasty Norton really is to a system. I'd never recommend it to anyone. I prefer lightweight software myself though, with the exception of Photoshop
I will refrain from any debate simply because of my known bias, but just one point of contention:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Red_October_7000
No Laptop as a primary machine. It will be dead inside two years, especially if left on 24/7.
It's the old "you get what you pay for" routine. Apple hardware may cost more but at least it lasts forever (although we'll have to wait and see with the new intel stuff). However.. I still use my "Pismo" PowerBook G3 every now and then and it's going on 8 years old... hasn't missed a single beat and it still runs 10.4 perfectly. It's only been since 10.5 "Leopard" that Apple considers it "obsolete," while it doesn't receive front line duty anymore I still expect many more years of service from the old gal...
I can't get enough of this thing... very happy with it!
Well, I went thru and shut down a bunch of programs that were running that I didn't need, and now I am going thru the startup.... I am trying to figure out how to disable or turn off the Norton, but there is just no way at all to do that... it is starting to tick me off... only thing to do is to remove it from the system. It's a 60 day trial, but then part of the package deal with the computer from CC was the $70 Norton program was free after rebate, so I guess I'll always have a full copy.
So far though it did free up some memory and things are faster, then I am going to go thru and delete all the bundled stuff that I have no use for, that should help out too.
I will admit, the new Macbook Pro's really caught my eye, but.... they are just so much money, I could never think about spending $1,500 on a computer, even a laptop.... not in this day and age. I remember when our Aptiva in '99 was $2,300.... heh. This $600 was pretty much my limit, I could have went a couple hundred higher, and get a few more features, but this really is a great package for the money. Plus I got all the free stuff (after rebates.... I don't really like rebates)
I know a lot of people that use their laptop as their only computer, leaving them on all the time too... all different brands, and no problems as of yet.... heck my 1996 Thinkpad still works fine and I used to use the heck out of that thing. I do plan on buying one of those laptop cooler things so when I am sitting at my desk at home (probably where I'll use it the most) that way it'll run cooler.
Oh, one more thing.... I've noticed that my Compaq, and pretty much all the other laptops at CC lacked a docking station port... I guess thats old news now?
On the circuit city tech data page it says 1gb included expandable to 2gb.... I'd like to find out for sure.... I just installed the Norton antivirus and installed 43 updates.... it is slower starting up now and according to the meter thing right now between 83-90% of the memory is being used and when the processor useage used to sit around 3-6% while typing the posts its now 15-30% and spikes..... I am starting to think that Norton antivirus is really bogging the computer.... unless it was the windows updates? I dunno I am going to try running with the Norton disabled and see how it fares.
Anti-virus, anti-popup, anti-spyware, basically all of the anti-malware bogs down your computer. You can thank the hineyholes that think it's clever to write this malicious code. I wouldn't get on the internet without it though.
I run a hardware firewall and Zonealarm Security Suite. So far so good.
Yeah, the Norton is bogging it down a little, but I guess its good? I dunno I've never used virus software in the past, I use Spybot Search & Destory tho, I downloaded it onto the laptop, but the one time I tried to run it, it didn't work or something, I'll have to try it again.
My computer does in fact only support 2gb of RAM.... that stinks, but I am pretty sure for my needs, 2gb is plenty.... right now my 1gb RAM is 78% used, but I do keep forgetting that the video memory is shared... so something like 228mb of that 1gb is going to the video memory. I bet with 2gb I won't have to worry about memory much more. Here is the spec page for my computer:
I really shouldn't be complaining, my IBM Aptiva (P3, 500mhz) came with 128mb SDRAM, and I remember it was big news for me when I maxed that mainboard out by adding a 2nd stick of 128mb.... for 256mb total
I really am diggin this vista and especially the sidebar thing. I downloaded an XM gadget, so I can play my XM thru the desktop, all my favorites are right there and stuff, it tells you the neame of the song and artist... its pretty awesome.
Oh, and I read up on one of the including trials... Vongo, I've got 30 days free when I activate it, but then its only $10/month, so apparently its like renting movies, but its done right online and it sends the movies to the computer... thats really cool, thats about 2 Block Buster rentals, and if I can get movies sent right to the computer whenever I am connected to wi-fi, that'll be sweet. I think watching movies on this computer will be nice, with the sharp widescreen and pretty nice speakers, I want to try it out.
One other thing, from how I understand it, I have 64mb dedicated video memory and up to 224mb shared... for a total of 288mb video memory.
In the past when there was shared video memory, I was able to select how much video memory I wanted, but I can't seem to find where I can do that... anyone have an idea? or is it just maxed out from the start with no user changeable settings?
