Upgrade to SSD or upgrade laptop

cmssjone

Hi all,

I have a Dell Precision M4700 workstation and have been pretty happy with it for the last few years. However, it seems to have become very slow over the last 6 months and takes an age to boot up/login. I have reinstalled windows and pruned everything but it still appears very sluggish on bootup. Would I be better to buy an new laptop or upgrade to an SSD? Thanks in advance for any advice.

Johnboy1951

Maybe provide the specs for your machine ..... otherwise it is a guessing game.

Is this it?

"Intel Core i7-3720QM quad-core processor with vPro support,
a special NVIDIA Quadro K2000M graphics card with 2 GB of GDDR3 memory,
16 GB of RAM and
256 GB of SSD memory"
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Dell-Precision-M4700-Mobile-Workstation.81505.0.html

or maybe?
Intel Core i7-3920XM,
32 GB of RAM

cmssjone

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Maybe provide the specs for your machine ..... otherwise it is a guessing game.

Is this it?

"Intel Core i7-3720QM quad-core processor with vPro support,
a special NVIDIA Quadro K2000M graphics card with 2 GB of GDDR3 memory,
16 GB of RAM and
256 GB of SSD memory"
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Dell-Precision-M4700-Mobile-Workstation.81505.0.html

or maybe?
Intel Core i7-3920XM,
32 GB of RAM

It's an i7 3540M, 16GB RAM DDR 3 (I think), Quadro Nvidia K200M card. It doesn't have a SSD drive though and I'm wondering whether this is the upgrade I need or whether it's time to change laptop. I would like to play some up to date games but this is not my priority tbh. Thanks for the reply

TomOnBoard

cmssjone wrote: »

It's an i7 3540M, 16GB RAM DDR 3 (I think), Quadro Nvidia K200M card. It doesn't have a SSD drive though and I'm wondering whether this is the upgrade I need or whether it's time to change laptop. I would like to play some up to date games but this is not my priority tbh. Thanks for the reply

I'd add an SSD. Huge improvement possible.

cmssjone

Thanks for your input Tom. How much should that cost including installation? Cheers!

TomOnBoard

cmssjone wrote: »

Thanks for your input Tom. How much should that cost including installation? Cheers!

A) how capable are you with an install of a physical drive

will the chassis take a second internal drive?

C) are you able to clone a drive yourself? Do you have an external enclosure?

D) what size is the hard drive in the machine now? How much space has been used? How.much can you free up? It's highly highly unlikely you'll be buying an SSD that's as big as your current drive, so these questions are very relevant.

cmssjone

TomOnBoard wrote: »

A) how capable are you with an install of a physical drive

will the chassis take a second internal drive?

C) are you able to clone a drive yourself? Do you have an external enclosure?

D) what size is the hard drive in the machine now? How much space has been used? How.much can you free up? It's highly highly unlikely you'll be buying an SSD that's as big as your current drive, so these questions are very relevant.

A) Probably not able
Yes
C) If it's just following instructions then yes
D) 1TB. 655GB free of 930 but I have unlimited cloud space through work and will be starting to put all docs etc into the cloud.

I have been quoted 150 euro by a computer store for a 240 GB SSD (Kingston) and set up. Is this fair?

Thanks for your help.

positron

Look up a video on YouTube on changing hard drives, it's easy. You already know how to reinstall windows. You have a easy backup solution (cloud). Buy a 240 or 512 GB SSD, should cost between 40 to less than 100 euro max, backup up everything, remove current drive, install SSD, install windows, lapto would feel brand new.

If you don't have windows install media, you can create installation usb key, again loads of tips online.

I upgraded a 7 year old i3 with 3 GB RAM and it's perfectly useable, even runs Zwift!!

TerrorFirmer

Your base spec is fine so an SSD would be a great and worthwhile upgrade, though you did mention up to date games, unfortunately for that you definitely would need a new laptop. Something like Fifa 18 would run on it pretty OK, maybe Overwatch at lower settings, but most of the latest games wouldn't run right even at lowest settings/resolution.

It's a decent machine still for everything but games, so the SSD upgrade is really up to you.

cmssjone

Thanks for all the advice guys. Think I will just get a new SSD as playing games isn't really a priority and I'd rather just spend 100 Euros than have to buy a new machine.

PropJoe10

No need at all for a new machine there, unless you're doing either gaming or very processor-intensive tasks. Make sure to back up anything important on your current hard drive before doing anything, even cloning. In fact, a fresh install on an SSD might be the best bet rather than cloning over an existing installation.

Peatys

cmssjone wrote: »

Thanks for all the advice guys. Think I will just get a new SSD as playing games isn't really a priority and I'd rather just spend 100 Euros than have to buy a new machine.

You'll be very happy with the speed increases. I went from a standard drive to an ssd on a 3rd gen i5.
Boots/shutsdown in 4 or 5 seconds and opens applications almost instantly.

theteal

Yup SSD will have you sorted. The specs of yours look savage compared to mine 4 year old build but mine still boots instantly

For comparison my specs:
Intel Pentium Anniversary - still have yet to overclock
8GB DDR3
64GB Crucial M4 SSD - there’s a hodgepodge of old mechanical disks in it for storage
No graphics card as I’ve still yet to get around to it, most likely too late now

tedpan

cmssjone wrote:

I have a Dell Precision M4700 workstation and have been pretty happy with it for the last few years. However, it seems to have become very slow over the last 6 months and takes an age to boot up/login. I have reinstalled windows and pruned everything but it still appears very sluggish on bootup. Would I be better to buy an new laptop or upgrade to an SSD? Thanks in advance for any advice.

My m4700 died a few years ago, gpu failure. How did they sell you that without an SSD??

I switched to solid state in 2007 and never looked back. Honestly don't know how people how people cope with a mechanical drive..

smuggler.ie

cmssjone wrote: »

A) Probably not able
Yes
C) If it's just following instructions then yes
D) 1TB. 655GB free of 930 but I have unlimited cloud space through work and will be starting to put all docs etc into the cloud.

I have been quoted 150 euro by a computer store for a 240 GB SSD (Kingston) and set up. Is this fair?

Thanks for your help.

A. Instruction here (unless i got model wrong)
B. There is no 2nd bay for HDD/SDD (unless i got model wrong)
C. Samsung Evo850 on Amazon and its less than 150 for 500GB. Samsung comes with cloning software and instruction.
D.1 for cloning your new drive has to have same size or more than your current usage = 500GB
D.2 for fresh install drive could be less but don't go to cheap, get at least 256GB

Johnboy1951

Based on your intended use I would say an SSD would be a good 'upgrade' to that machine.
I would also advise a fresh install of the operating system.

Swapping the present HDD for an SSD should be easy, just make sure you have the bootable media from which to install the OS.

The present HDD can be placed in an external 'caddy' and used to backup the data you intend to put 'in the cloud'.

Skerries

this should give you an idea of what that GPU can play

https://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-Quadro-K2000M.76893.0.html

cmssjone

Thanks again to everyone who has contributed - it's made my decision pretty easy!

cmssjone

tedpan wrote: »

My m4700 died a few years ago, gpu failure. How did they sell you that without an SSD??

I switched to solid state in 2007 and never looked back. Honestly don't know how people how people cope with a mechanical drive..

I bought the laptop off adverts a few years ago. No SSD but was certainly quick enough for me at the time.

tedpan

cmssjone wrote:

I bought the laptop off adverts a few years ago. No SSD but was certainly quick enough for me at the time.

You'll see what quick is soon man!

coylemj

smuggler.ie wrote: »

C. Samsung Evo850 on Amazon and its less than 150 for 500GB. Samsung comes with cloning software and instruction.

You have to order the appropriate kit, it's possible to buy the SSD by itself. I bought a Samsung EVO SSD a few years ago and I recall that there was a few options around the cable and cloning s/w. I bought the full kit (SSD, cable and cloning s/w) and felt it was worth it for the stress-free migration.

It went something like this.....

1. Shutdown the laptop, connect the SSD as an external drive into a USB port using the supplied cable.
2. Boot the Samsung CD which will clone your current HDD onto the SSD.
3. Swap out the HDD, replace it with the SSD
4. Boot up and away you go.

The cable can be used with the old HDD for backups, it's not totally obsolete after the migration.

TomOnBoard

1. Backup your current drive.
2. Get rid of rubbish. Use cclean after a good perusal through spacesniffer. Delete all the old watched movies and other unwanted large files.
3. Shrink existing partition in drive to used size + 20%.
4. Install fresh Windows in newly partitioned area and boot into whichever version you want at startup
5. Test / assess speed differences
6. This will show you the performance overhead of your existing install which will have degraded over time. It will also indicate possible disk corruption.
7. Use chkdsk on existing drive

This will leave you in a very good place to make your final decision

HTH

TomOnBoard

cmssjone wrote: »

A) Probably not able
Yes
C) If it's just following instructions then yes
D) 1TB. 655GB free of 930 but I have unlimited cloud space through work and will be starting to put all docs etc into the cloud.

I have been quoted 150 euro by a computer store for a 240 GB SSD (Kingston) and set up. Is this fair?

Thanks for your help.

Not off the wall if they leave you with the existing drive nd the SSD is new.

However you may be missing out on a great learning opportunity if you have an interest. Some do, some don't.

smuggler.ie

coylemj wrote: »

You have to order the appropriate kit, it's possible to buy the SSD by itself. I bought a Samsung EVO SSD a few years ago and I recall that there was a few options around the cable and cloning s/w. I bought the full kit (SSD, cable and cloning s/w) and felt it was worth it for the stress-free migration.

It went something like this.....

1. Shutdown the laptop, connect the SSD as an external drive into a USB port using the supplied cable.
2. Boot the Samsung CD which will clone your current HDD onto the SSD.
3. Swap out the HDD, replace it with the SSD
4. Boot up and away you go.

The cable can be used with the old HDD for backups, it's not totally obsolete after the migration.

Software(CD/DVD) included as part of purchase, enclosure not - €7-10 on Ebay or free of charge loan from a friend.

cmssjone

I got my laptop back today after having it upgraded to a SSD and I am amazed at the difference in speed - it's blowing me away! I'm so glad that I didn't buy a new laptop and I'd like to thank everyone again who commented on this thread. Cheers!

FanadMan

cmssjone wrote: »

I got my laptop back today after having it upgraded to a SSD and I am amazed at the difference in speed - it's blowing me away! I'm so glad that I didn't buy a new laptop and I'd like to thank everyone again who commented on this thread. Cheers!

Great thing is, if you do ever buy a new laptop you can add the upgraded SSD as extra storage.

devnull

Samsung Evo is for sure the way to go - Samsung Magician and Samsung Drive Migration are very easy to use and results work very well.

Note if you're cloning a HD to an SSD you need to make sure that you make the PC boot from the SSD after it's complete - normally you can change this in the BIOS but a warning that at least some BIOS version seem to ignore what's set in there for booth devices, seen that thing effect ASUS and Acer machines recently.

coylemj

devnull wrote: »

Samsung Evo is for sure the way to go - Samsung Magician and Samsung Drive Migration are very easy to use and results work very well.

+1

devnull wrote: »

Note if you're cloning a HD to an SSD you need to make sure that you make the PC boot from the SSD after it's complete - normally you can change this in the BIOS but a warning that at least some BIOS version seem to ignore what's set in there for booth devices, seen that thing effect ASUS and Acer machines recently.

I didn't have to change anything in my Lenovo SL510 laptop - I cloned the HDD to the SSD, swapped the SSD into the HDD slot and it booted from the SSD no problem and with no changes to the BIOS.

devnull

coylemj wrote: »

I didn't have to change anything in my Lenovo SL510 laptop - I cloned the HDD to the SSD, swapped the SSD into the HDD slot and it booted from the SSD no problem and with no changes to the BIOS.

I've seen a number of desktop machines where physically you need to change the cable/slots to make it boot from the SSD, regardless of what is selected in the BIOS.

I did an ASUS machine last week where after cloning I changed the BIOS to have the SSD as the first boot device and the second boot device was set to blank, yet it still booted from the HDD.

It was a pretty small cramped case with very little room so moving cables around wasn't so easy I had to take a whole load of components out to be able to switch the cables around.

Seems that the BIOS picked the device on the first SATA channel to boot regardless of what it was told to do.