Need help in finding the slowest component

[Hansi2]

Hello,

I can't bear it anymore... I need to upgrade my system, but don't know the right component.

Here is my actual configuration:

Duron 1300
256 MB DDR CL2 (Infineon)
Asrock K7VT2 (Lan, Sound AC'97) with VIA KT266A
Geforce 2 MX 400 64MB(MSI)
HD1 (System): Seagate ST360020A 60GB, 5400 RPM, Ultra-ATA/100
HD2 (Backup): Quantum Fireball lct1520 19GB, 4500 RPM, Ultra-ATA/66)
Windows XP

Last week I upgraded memory from SD to DDR, and I was surprised of the increased performance. But now I want more... MORE! ;-)
Lets say, I can't spend more than 120 EUR.

Now I don't know, what to buy:

(- the highest CPU my mainboard support: Athlon XP 2400+ (80 EUR)

or

- a new up-to-date HD)

and possibly

- additional 256 MB DDR (40 EUR)


Most of time when my PC hangs for a while, the HD is working very hard...
But with CPU-Monitoring I see the processor works again and again for short times at 100%, while power-using of course most of the time...

I would be very pleased for any serious advice. Please remember, I can't buy all the things I would really need...
and I don't need a playstation, all I want to do is working with many apps and doing some simple multimedia purposes - but all of them at the same time.

And does somebody know a benchmark-tool which can say: this is the weakest link in the chain?

Greetings
Hansi

 

[paparazi]

Well you pretty much sussed it yourself, the one thing that will give you the biggest boost is the CPU, taking it to the 2.4 limit will have considerable performance benefits.
Don't forget, you will need a much better cooler (copper bottomed preferably) for the hotter XP2.4+ and at least one extra case fan.
Next big jump would be purchasing a fast 7,200rpm hard drive. The fastest standard ATA drive is Western Digital's "Special Edition" with 8meg cache if your budget allows.
Via's KT266a chipset is getting a little old now but is still a cracking chipset, changing to an Nforce2 400 chipset equipt motherboard would only gain you about a 15% performance increase so is not your best upgrade option given your budget.
The performance gain from adding another 256DDR is also minimal, (from 256 to 512 is about 5%) but adding more memory does generally make your PC run cleaner with less of a tenancey to hang etc.
Martin
Martin

Replying helps further our knowledge, without comment leaves us wondering.

 

[soaplover]

Don't forget the powersupply ,if you are rebuilding you can end up drawing more power than today's setup .
I would agree with paparazi about the WD (have it myself) .
I would :
1) faster HDD (check if improvments are to your liking)
if not
2)faster cpu and more ram.(check if improvments are to your liking)
if not
3)nForce mb.


//Regards Soaplover

 

[Hansi2]

Hello,

thanks for your advices.

But now I have two of them: one says to upgrade my cpu, second to upgrade my hd...

I phoned my vendor and he advised me a 2.4 CPU instead of a u133 7200rpm 8mb-hd (81/82 EUR). So thats two vs. one ;-).

Cooling is no problem, I guess. I have a "arctic cooling copper silent" which supports up to 2.8 AMD XP, and I have a case-fan, too.
My Duron1300 is now about 47°C, case-temp is about 35°C.
Also, my power supply should be alright. It is an enermax at 350W.

But I am really surprised that you didn't recommend more ram firstly... Now I really save money

 

[mainegeek]

I would suggest a CPU upgrade too. Also keep your system maintained. Run defrag, keep your start-up to a minimum and check the event viewer periodically.

 

[Grunt2002]

Hi,

I would say : buy BOTH cpu and hdd.

You can find affordable 7200 hdd's around 55-60 EUR (60 gb, 2mb cache which is not good as 8 but 100 times better than a 5400 rpm).
About the cpu, I would buy a 1.8 ghz athlon xp (0.13 micron) at 65 EUR too. That's 125 €
I only buy online, this is much more cheaper. Hardware fans websites give you much more informations, reviews and tests and objectivity than any vendor would (

http://www.tomshardware.com,

http://www.hardware.fr

in ze french)

I don't know if your asrock mobo allows overclocking, think well : asus is the preferred constructor of overclockers.
If yes, you will be able to easily increase your cpu speed from 1.8 to a 2.2 or even 2.4 level without danger (I can swear it). Overclocking is not the big bad wolf, it is becoming more and more a common thing, and is safe ***as long as you don't play with voltages*** (what really is not required, except for so-called 'extreme' overclocking).
AMD 0.13 micron xp processors were *designed* to be overclockable, if not design to be overclocked (little guys like overclockers actually are the best client a manufacturer would like : they by 1 or 2 systems a year, perform tests on anything they buy, discuss strenghts and weaknesses in forums, so even their feedback is available).

You have a very good power supply (same as mine), and a very good cpu fan. So you already have what could have been a bottleneck for overclocking.

A 0.13 micron athlon xp will not be as hot as your duron which most likely is 0.18 technology.

Hope it helps, got links on overclocking if you want

Anyway, take your time before buying, be sure you're well informed, money does not flow that easily


Grunt

 

[Grunt2002]

... by the way, your mobo most likely supports more than a 2400+, but your current bios version does not. Flashing a bios update from asus' website would allow you to run higher cpu's. Bios flashing is a common thing. The risk is only limited to a power shutdown during the 10 seconds it lasts.

 

[nlm9802]

my recommendation for the upgrade that will give you the biggest performance gain:
reinstall XP.

it sounds like you've had it a while and there is something (spyware?) running in the background taking up your cpu time.

also, an athlon would help tremendously.. duron's are the equivalent of intel's celeron.

A faster hard drive would be beneficial, but not nearly as noticable as the 2 above.

cliff notes:
reinstall OS, buy faster processor.

Nick
Computer Support, no not just hardware.. I support everything

 

[paparazi]

Grunt2002, I am inclined to agree that the XP2.4+ is the highest CPU this motherboard will support due to the 266fsb default support of the Via KT266a chipset.
AMD did make XP2.6+ CPU's in 266fsb variety but only for a few weeks before changing to 333.
Martin

Replying helps further our knowledge, without comment leaves us wondering.

 

[cdogg]

In terms of overall performance, the CPU is definitely the weakest component in your system and should have the highest priority.

The video card would be the next on my list, but if you're not too keen on gaming or 3D rendering, then skip it and go for a new 8MB cache hard drive. Despite what some have said here, a 7200RPM ATA/100/133 drive won't give you that much of a performance boost over a 5400RPM ATA/100 drive, unless it has the extra 8MB cache. Even then, the amount of performance gain will be minimal. If you go this route, definitely make sure the new drive contains the boot partition. Also, realize that there's no need to go with Serial ATA or ATA/133. Both are nice to have for future upgrades, but not necessary.

1) CPU
2) Hard drive - sell your 19GB ATA/66 drive
3) Video card
4) RAM
5) Sound card (if the hardware you're using now is integrated in the motherboard, then a soundcard will release more resources to the CPU and run more efficiently)


~cdogg
[tab]"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources"
[tab][tab]- A. Einstein

 

[Hansi2]

Hi Folks!

So much answers, I am very pleased
Perhaps a good thing that I didn't buy anything today...

Because of the hangings I decided a week ago to format and install XP. And this time, it was nearly an adventure.
I surveyed the performance very well by comparing the playback-quality of a divx-video.
And there are really some programs, which definitly decreased the performance! For instance "Zonealarm" (I couldn't believe it, too).

Fortunately, this time of xp-installation, after installing a "good" program, I made an image which I played back after every "bad" prog (I don't trust the uninstall-routines at all).
And now I have all things installed I need. And the video plays excellent.

But in the last days I installed several benchmark and other "free" tools, so Adaware really found sth., but it was "only" alexa in the registry...

Now that I save the money for additional ram, I really think about buying both, a cpu and hdd.
But one after another

And if I buy a new cpu, I (will?) want to "double" the existing MHz, and so I want nothing less than the mb features. Also, this will be the last "cycle" for my mb: the next cpu-upgrade will contain a new mb (fsb266 is dead, you almost can't buy 266-ram anymore).

Overclocking is no option for me... First, the asrock bios is extremely simple, I just wondered I can define the cas-latency and the mhz but nothing more...
And I won't flash it with an asus bios. Bios-updating is very risky, of course in most cases because of the "human-factor" (unless you live in "blackout usa" ;-)).
I only update the bios when I have to, and I don't have to overclock...
Some time ago, there were overclocking procedures around by "overwriting" bridges with a pencil, and I really thought about it. But by the lack of money... Neither I don't want to make a fault nor shorten the cpu's lifetime...

Well, you see, I am not a man who loves the risk - not in that way.
But nevertheless, good links about overclocking are welcome. Who knows what will be... ;-)

For a new hdd: my mb supports u133. If you said nothing about it, I had bought it...

To my video-card: as I said, I am not a player. For me, it's enough to play with middle or low settings. And with a 2.4 cpu, I guess I can play most games, even May Payne 2, in middle quality, isn't it?


Well, thank you very very much for all of your help!

Greetings
Hansi

PS: There are english faults in my posting? Corrections are welcome, if you like. And if you really know about it, of course.

 

[ceh4702]

A 5400rpm hard drive is not good for games. An ATA100 or ATA133 hard drive will run at 7200 RPM. You will see a noticeable difference from that.

If you could go to an Athlon CPU of XP2400+ that would also be a good boost. I am thinking a Duron runs at 200Mhz Bus Speed and the Athlon at 266 (133 X 2). This may make the DDR RAM work Faster Too.

After that Maybe a new motherboard. I am inclined to recommend the Motherboard and CPU be upgraded together. Having a motheroard that supports a XP2500 Barton Core AthlonXP processor would be an extra boost. Then you can use DDR333 or DDR400 memory, depending on the processor.

I built my son a computer with just an XP2400+ processor with PC2100 DDR266 RAM and he got a good video card for it and he has been playing HALO for the PC on it at college without any trouble. For games, the video card coupled with the motherboard is often a very critical link. CPU speed is important, but without a good video card you are spinning your wheels. My son is using an Asus A7N8X Deluxe and a ATI 9800 All-In-Wonder he won in a raffle (Lucky Dog).

Sound cards can cause computers to crash also. You can try better drivers to get around many obstacles. Upgrading Windows can help also. Newer drivers may require the latest version of DX 9. I had an old ATI VE 32 MB video card and it had newer drivers, but you had to install DX 9 to get it to work just right.

If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.

 

[cdogg]

"[blue]An ATA100 or ATA133 hard drive will run at 7200 RPM[/blue]"
Not all ATA100 drives are 7200RPM. For example, Hansi's current system has a 5400RPM ATA100 drive.


&quot;[blue]A 5400rpm hard drive is not good for games...You will see a noticeable difference from <a 7200RPM drive>[/blue]&quot;
This is definitely debatable and not worth getting into. Although the performance increase from a 7200RPM drive over a 5400RPM drive is guaranteed, the real question is how much to expect. Older 5400RPM drives were horrible in performance. However, once 5400RPM drives reached the 20GB mark, disk access times improved due to higher densities on each platter.

So if you're comparing a 5400RPM 60GB to a 7200RPM 80GB with 2MB cache, you're not going to see hardly any improvement. The only time I would honestly recommend an upgrade is if the user grabs a 7200RPM drive with an 8MB cache and a capacity larger than 100GB. Otherwise, it's probably just a waste.


~cdogg
[tab]&quot;The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources&quot;
[tab][tab]- A. Einstein

 

[micker377]

Befor condemning your hard drive, make sure your DMA is set right. You'd be surprised how much difference it makes.

 

[Grunt2002]

Hello,

Paparazi is right(as usual) about the support limit of your mobo (2.4 ghz).

As promised, some links on oc...

FAQ :

http://www.hyperformance-pc.com/overclocking_faq.htm

Beginner's guide :

http://www.viperlair.com/articles/howto/cpu/unlock/

OC will not work with every cpu :

http://www.amdmb.com/article-display.php?ArticleID=188

Try

http://www.amd.com

if you have to mount your system or parts of it by yourself (nice how-to videos).

Cheers,

Grunt

 

[ceh4702]

I find it difficult to beleive anyone would purposely buy a 5400 rpm hard drive for a Desktop System unless they wanted to conserve energy. There is not much price difference between a 5400 and a 7200 rmp 40 GIG Hard Drive. I know some OEM's may have saved a dollar or 3 or 5 doing this at one time, but this can get to the point of rediculous penny pinching.

Now if we were talking extra storage that is not often accessed a 5400rpm hard drive might actually be a good idea. It might make the drive last longer produce less heat and use less energy. Anything is fast enough for general word processing and basic office tasks. So if you just want to store some downloaded files or back up some files, a 5400 drive can come in handy. However, in the grand scheme of things, having one and only one hard drive in a computer makes for less clutter inside a computer case and less generation of heat and less crowding.

For any new operating system like XP having 512 Megs of Memory or up to 1 Gig can help take some of the load off of the Hard Drive. DMA was mentioned. DMA has Modes. I think we are up to Mode 5. DMA is important for Hard Drives and it is also important for CDROM'S, CD r/w'S, DVD's and DVD r/w's.

Many games are coming out on DVD's, so that might be an option, if you are replacing an old CDROM that no longer is keeping up. Being able to read a DVD might be nice. This can be the difference between a 4 CD game and a 1 DVD game.

If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.

 

[cdogg]

ceh4702,
I agree that it wouldn't make much sense to buy a 5400RPM drive over a 7200RPM drive when the price is practically the same. Besides, 5400RPM drives are getting harder and harder to find anymore.

However, Hansi already has a 5400RPM ATA100 drive. The question was whether he should upgrade the drive to 7200RPM, and it seemed like you were saying YES at first.


~cdogg
[tab]&quot;The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources&quot;
[tab][tab]- A. Einstein

 

[Hansi2]

Hello,

I bought a new cpu (athlon xp 2400+), and here is my report:

I am feeling like... well, let me do this analogue:

My car is too slow. I need 20sec to 100km/h and its speedlimit is 140km/h.
Now I have a new motor.
It needs now 10sec to 100km/h (what a boost!) but its speedlimit increased only to 150km/h (although I expected min. 200km/h).

Actually, my pc's &quot;working-behaviour&quot; isn't better than before. I guess, everytime the hdd is involved, it is all the same. For example, with McAfee AV/PF, Outlook and emule in the background, there is no perfect dvd-playback possible. Every Minute or so it hangs around...

Well, I did some benchmarks of course and reinstalled xp (thats why I am reporting late, among other things), and they are all as fast as they should - except my hdd. The fastest speed is 30MB/s, although udma5 is working and the latest via-servicepack is installed.
SiSoftSandra gives my hdd 10.000 Indexpoints. The same hdd (but half the size) has 20.000 and the one I want to buy (7.200rpm, 8Mb, U100) has 30.000 Indexpoints.
That sounds that sth. is wrong, but I don't know what. Everything is working fine, all tests didn't find anything wrong.
At the end of this text I post a testresult, perhaps someone will find sth.

When I bought my hdd, I wanted 5400rpm, because I was afraid of too much heat, too much noise and a short lifetime.
Now, I have a case-fan, a mainboard with temp-sensors and noise should be also better, so I am not anxious anymore.

Thanks for all of your posts.

==========================================================
Here is the hdd-benchmark (h2benchw from

http://www.heise.de):

----------------------------------------------------------
Disk: ST360020A
Capacity: CHS=(7297/255/63), 117226305 sectors = 57239 MByte

Interface transfer rate w/ block size 128 sectors at 0.0% of capacity:
Sequential read rate medium (w/out delay): 27861 KByte/s
Sequential transfer rate w/ read-ahead (delay: 2.53 ms): 32322 KByte/s
Repetitive sequential read (&quot;core test&quot: 68532 KByte/s

Sustained transfer rate (block size: 128 sectors):
Reading: average 24147.1, min 16964.1, max 29598.5 [KByte/s]

Random access read: average 18.86, min 3.35, max 44.25 [ms]
Random access read (<504 MByte): average 9.40, min 0.12, max 68.86 [ms]

Application profile `swapping': 4970.7 KByte/s
Application profile `installing': 5413.6 KByte/s
Application profile `Word': 8126.2 KByte/s
Application profile `Photoshop': 7674.2 KByte/s
Application profile `copying': 11442.9 KByte/s
Application profile `F-Prot': 4811.5 KByte/s
Result: application index = 6.6
!!! WARNING: application profiles inaccurate since measured read-only
ATA disk: ST360020A
Serial #: 6EX09J3P
Firmware: 3.39
Version of specification: ATA-ATAPI-6
Buffer size: 2048 KByte
Supported UDMA modes: 0 1 2 3 4 5
UDMA mode 5 active.
capacity (28-bit addressing): 117231408 sectors (57241.9 MByte)
48-bit addressing not supported.
Acoustic management set to 254 (vendor's recommended value: 254)
----------------------------
And here is the Sandra-Test:
----------------------------
Test Status
SMP Test : No
Total Test Threads : 1
SMT Test : No
Dynamic MP/MT Load Balance : No
Processor Affinity : No
Windows Disk Cache Used : No
Use Overlapped I/O : Yes
IO Queue Depth : 8 request(s)
Test File Size : 255MB
File Server Optimised : No

Benchmark Breakdown
Buffered Read : 20 MB/s
Sequential Read : 20 MB/s
Random Read : 3910 kB/s
Buffered Write : 12 MB/s
Sequential Write : 20 MB/s
Random Write : 5 MB/s
Average Access Time : 13 ms (estimated)

Drive
Drive Type : Hard Disk
Total Size : 49GB
Free Space : 2GB, 100%

 

[Grunt2002]

Hi,

Is SMART enabled on this disk ? (SMART stands for something like 'Self Management And Repair Technology').

I am no hd expert so I don't know if your disk could or could not enforce smart given its model, but one way to check it is to go in the bios setup menu at boot, and then browse the menu entries for disk settings. Yous should see something about smart.

At bios POST, you could also have a message line saying

Primary master : /something/ on IDE-0, SMART capable but disabled

OR

Primary master : /something/ on IDE-0, SMART capable and enabled

or something like that, depending on your bios.

SMART is a technology that reduces disk read/write failures but also disk speeds. My disks always run with smart off.

If enabled, disabling it (through the bios menu) will let you notice an improvement.

Hope it helps,
Hope paparazi won't explain me I am wrong ;-)

Cheers,

Grunt

 

[mainegeek]

Grunt2002,
S.M.A.R.T. Stands for &quot;Self Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology&quot;. It is a feature that resides with in the hard drive and not the bios. Though you can choose to enable or disable &quot;Polling&quot; from the bios (if it is supported) or from utility software such as Norton System Doctor. Enabling smart polling does have a negetive effect on performance.