should I upgrade?

[jambonay]

I have a Dell Precision M70 laptop running XP Pro, 2 GHz Pentium M processor, 2 GB of RAM, NVIDIA Quadro FX1400 Video card.
It has gotten increasingly sluggish to the point that I am contemplating doing a clean reinstall of OS to try and clean it up. MS says it will run Windows 7, the drivers seem to be available for the major components. My question is will I get a noticeable improvement in performance with Win 7 vs. XP?

 

[DeaconFrost]

I wouldn't say you'd get much of a noticeable difference on that system, but at the same time, you won't lose any performance either. The main performance difference are seen on higher end systems that can flex the technology muscles of the new OS. That being said, there are plenty of usability features in Windows 7 that would make the upgrade worth it to me. When I have to work on someone else's computer with XP, it is painful!

Windows 7 does a great job of self-maintaining, where as Windows XP installs did seem to grind down in performance over time. Something to consider.

 

[seekermeister]

In some things yes, in others no...overall yes.

EDIT: Since I'm not familiar with your equipment, I'll defer to DeaconFrost's assessment.

 

[Pauly]

I have a Dell Precision M70 laptop running XP Pro, 2 GHz Pentium M processor, 2 GB of RAM, NVIDIA Quadro FX1400 Video card.
It has gotten increasingly sluggish to the point that I am contemplating doing a clean reinstall of OS to try and clean it up. MS says it will run Windows 7, the drivers seem to be available for the major components. My question is will I get a noticeable improvement in performance with Win 7 vs. XP?

You will notice an improvement if you do a clean install of either OS
You should find 7 to be better than XP but how much of a difference is the question

I recently formatted an XP machine and installed 7 and it was loads quicker especially on boot but i feel that is was mostly down to the fact it was a clean install, its hard to tell unless you have a clean xp then a clean 7

What i can tell you is that 7 is an excellent OS and i would recommend it to anyone if your prepared to cough up the bucks

 

[computersplus]

Upgrade

do yourself a favor and upgrade we are now two OS's newer it would be kinda like using windows 95 when XP was available lol...

 

[whs]

I would buy a Win7 OEM distro for $105 and upgrade. Every time I have to touch an XP system to help out a friend, I get annoyed because it is so cumbersome.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...752&cm_re=windows7_oem-_-32-116-752-_-Product

 

[jambonay]

thanks for the feedback, I am particularly interested in increasing the boot-up speed as is takes up to ten minutes for this laptop to get fully up to speed as it is. It was faster when new but never as fast as a machine running vista

 

[computersplus]

Start up

laptops usually startup slower because they have slower hard drives

 

[seekermeister]

I would buy a Win7 OEM distro for $105 and upgrade. Every time I have to touch an XP system to help out a friend, I get annoyed because it is so cumbersome.

Newegg.com - Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit 1-Pack for System Builders - Operating Systems

Personally, I wouldn't recommend OEM, because of it being tied only to the computer that it is first installed on, and not being able to install it again. I bought my Win7 Pro upgrade for only $129 shipped, and think the few extra dollar well worth while.

http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-WINDOWS-7-P...emQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item2304d727a6

Plus that Newegg offer only includes the x32 disk.

 

[jambonay]

It has a 7200 rpm 60 gig HD. Are there faster or solid state ones out there now that will fit in this Laptop?

 

[computersplus]

SSD

It has a 7200 rpm 60 gig HD. Are there faster or solid state ones out there now that will fit in this Laptop?

SSD's yes but they are still exspensive it's good you have the 7200 RPM most have 5400 RPM

 

[jambonay]

I see a OCZ 60 gig SATA SSD on Tiger Direct for 199. I don't need a huge amount of storage on this particular machine. Is there any reason not to go ahead and swap out my old drive for this one, install Windows 7 and that way I can use my old drive as an archive of stuff I don't want to move onto the new one? I have a docking station I can install the old drive into with one of those adapters.

 

[computersplus]

Sure

sure if you want to spend the bucks go for it

 

[WDAexodus]

Yeah, it definately will decrease your boot up time. Not sure if I would cough up that much though for a work laptop. I think personally with the clean install of W7 you'll be happy with the bootup time.

 

[Pauly]

Yeah, it definately will decrease your boot up time. Not sure if I would cough up that much though for a work laptop. I think personally with the clean install of W7 you'll be happy with the bootup time.

I agree

If you are thinking of going that route i would buy 7 first load it on your current disk, think you might be suprised at the boot time of clean install, then if still not happy get SSD

 

[whs]

I would buy a Win7 OEM distro for $105 and upgrade. Every time I have to touch an XP system to help out a friend, I get annoyed because it is so cumbersome.

Newegg.com - Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit 1-Pack for System Builders - Operating Systems

Personally, I wouldn't recommend OEM, because of it being tied only to the computer that it is first installed on, and not being able to install it again. I bought my Win7 Pro upgrade for only $129 shipped, and think the few extra dollar well worth while.

NEW WINDOWS 7 Professional Upgrade Retail DVD 32&64 Bit - eBay (item 150405064614 end time Feb-12-10 05:37:31 PST)

Plus that Newegg offer only includes the x32 disk.

That's a very good alternative. At Newegg it is either 32bit or 64bit - but for the same price.

 

[whs]

I see a OCZ 60 gig SATA SSD on Tiger Direct for 199. I don't need a huge amount of storage on this particular machine. Is there any reason not to go ahead and swap out my old drive for this one, install Windows 7 and that way I can use my old drive as an archive of stuff I don't want to move onto the new one? I have a docking station I can install the old drive into with one of those adapters.

Not all SSDs are equal. Make sure you get the right one. If you go OCZ (which is excellent) make sure you get a Vertex or Vertex turbo model. Then you need those at Firmware level 1.4 or 1.4.1 - else you have no Trim support (which is very important for write speed). You can always flash it to 1.4 level, but that is an extra step.

 

[IggyAZ]

I have a Dell Precision M70 laptop running XP Pro, 2 GHz Pentium M processor, 2 GB of RAM, NVIDIA Quadro FX1400 Video card.
It has gotten increasingly sluggish to the point that I am contemplating doing a clean reinstall of OS to try and clean it up. MS says it will run Windows 7, the drivers seem to be available for the major components. My question is will I get a noticeable improvement in performance with Win 7 vs. XP?

Until you decide if you will go with Win7 or not here is a Microsoft program for WinXP that adjusts you startup and rearranges stuff for a quicker bootup.

Just install and select a full scan on next bootup.
After you do this it will shutdown and restart.
It will be running in windows so be patient and wait.
First time may take 5 or 10 minutes but well worth it.
It will also be moving your key startup programs to the fastest part of your hard drive.

Here is the link.
Download BootVis 1.3.37.0 - BootVis - Microsoft tool to provide faster XP boot and resume times - Softpedia

 

[ullopoer5]

I'm running your setup, believe it or not. Precision m70. I've upgraded to Windows 7, and can testify that it's a heluva different OS. The Precision is a powerful machine, and handles it VERY well.

Aero? Eats it for breakfast.

In the "windows experience index" - the worst score you'll likely see is a 3.8 / 8 for your CPU speed. That's expected. It's a powerful single-core centrino that runs at 2.0GHz (for me). I'm looking to overclock it to 2.3GHz (since I've read elsewhere that it's still relatively stable at that point).

So go for it. I have a 320Gb hard drive in mine. That's the max it will take. Make special note that you can't get a SATA drive in here, which is the real kicker for why boot time is as fast as it is. It's IDE or bust, and the largest IDE that this precision will read, is the 320Gb sized one. You ain't gonna find an IDE that huge going at 7200rpm... it's 5400 for sure.

Hope that helps.

 

[Frostmourne]

I'm running your setup, believe it or not. Precision m70. I've upgraded to Windows 7, and can testify that it's a heluva different OS. The Precision is a powerful machine, and handles it VERY well.

Aero? Eats it for breakfast.

In the "windows experience index" - the worst score you'll likely see is a 3.8 / 8 for your CPU speed. That's expected. It's a powerful single-core centrino that runs at 2.0GHz (for me). I'm looking to overclock it to 2.3GHz (since I've read elsewhere that it's still relatively stable at that point).

So go for it. I have a 320Gb hard drive in mine. That's the max it will take. Make special note that you can't get a SATA drive in here, which is the real kicker for why boot time is as fast as it is. It's IDE or bust, and the largest IDE that this precision will read, is the 320Gb sized one. You ain't gonna find an IDE that huge going at 7200rpm... it's 5400 for sure.

Hope that helps.

The machine is weak but it will work reasonably well. Up the RAM though, 2GB isn't enough anymore.