Upgrading My Dell Inspiron Laptop

Harvey Meale said:

Hi ishmael9100,

I've got the same PC as you, and it runs everything I need to use it for perfectly. My motto's always been, 'Why fix something that is working normally?'. However, if you're looking to upgrade because you want more from it in high performance situations, I'd recommend upgrading the CPU. The Celeron has never been amazing, and you can do much better than that. Performance wise, you'll see a huge improvement just from tweaking that. Is there anything in particular that you wanted to get from upgrading your system?

Thanks,
Harvey Meale

Thank you very much for your help! What I really wanted was a good gaming experience but that is never going to happen unfortunately But an overall good performance and fast loading on programs would be great!

Harvey Meale said:

ishmael9100 said:

Harvey Meale said:

Hi ishmael9100,

I've got the same PC as you, and it runs everything I need to use it for perfectly. My motto's always been, 'Why fix something that is working normally?'. However, if you're looking to upgrade because you want more from it in high performance situations, I'd recommend upgrading the CPU. The Celeron has never been amazing, and you can do much better than that. Performance wise, you'll see a huge improvement just from tweaking that. Is there anything in particular that you wanted to get from upgrading your system?

Thanks,
Harvey Meale

Thank you very much for your help! What I really wanted was a good gaming experience but that is never going to happen unfortunately But an overall good performance and fast loading on programs would be great!

Hi ishmael9100,

Of course the Inspiron is never going to be a gaming beast, but I can run Counter-Strike Source with minimal lag. What separates it from being a gaming machine is the CPU and graphics card. If you're after a super fast PC, which the Inspiron can be, I'd look at upgrading the CPU.

Thanks,
Harvey Meale

Thank you very much! Would you recommend a CPU to upgrade to? I was thinking about the new 2010 iCore Processors. I wouldn't want the i3 nor the i7 or i7 Extreme so I think the i5 meets my needs. But, it is really expensive. Hmm... I don't know. Any processor better than Celeron.

Harvey Meale said:

Hi ishmael9100,

The Inspiron is definitely customizable, but it's important to remember what you want and what price suites your budget best. If what you want is improved speed and performance in general, you shouldn't need to upgrade to an i7 Extreme. Something like the Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T6600 (2.20GHz/800Mhz FSB/2MB cache) or the Intel® Core™ 2 Duo P8700 (2.53GHz/1066Mhz FSB/3MB cache) should definitely suffice to your needs. Check out the Dell website for information on upgrades. Here, 'This Link' will be of help. Good luck.

Thanks,
Harvey Meale

Wow, thanks for the information! I will look into this. I might need to upgrade my RAM to 8GB, like what you said, since Im running 64bit version of Windows. Thank you for all of your help! If I could give more rep, I would.

Harvey Meale said:

ishmael9100 said:

Harvey Meale said:

Hi ishmael9100,

The Inspiron is definitely customizable, but it's important to remember what you want and what price suites your budget best. If what you want is improved speed and performance in general, you shouldn't need to upgrade to an i7 Extreme. Something like the Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T6600 (2.20GHz/800Mhz FSB/2MB cache) or the Intel® Core™ 2 Duo P8700 (2.53GHz/1066Mhz FSB/3MB cache) should definitely suffice to your needs. Check out the Dell website for information on upgrades. Here, 'This Link' will be of help. Good luck.

Thanks,
Harvey Meale

Wow, thanks for the information! I will look into this. I might need to upgrade my RAM to 8GB, like what you said, since Im running 64bit version of Windows. Thank you for all of your help! If I could give more rep, I would.

Hi ishmael9100,

Don't sweat it. Let me know if you'd like anymore information.

Thanks,
Harvey Meale

Could you help me with a problem I have been having with my Intel Graphics Card? I made a thread on this but I have had no replies so far.