Tips & Tricks - Upgrade Your Laptop To Boost Performance.

4:00:00 AM

My Lovely Asus U35J
Portable and easy; two words that best describe a laptop. However, despite of that, we can't deny that there are some disadvantages of using a laptop too. One of it is the inability to upgrade most of your hardware. Differ from a PC,  once you buy a laptop, you have to accept and use whatever you got until you replace your laptop. You can't change to newer and more powerful processor, use cooler and more silent fan in the market, or even change to more stylish and up-to-date casing. However, there are still a few things that you can do for your beloved laptop.

1. Upgrade to performance RAM + more capacity

Performance RAM from Kingston
Upgrading your RAM (Random Access Memory) is the cheapest option that will give you instant performance boost. It's pretty direct, more RAM = better performance, faster RAM = Faster response. When buying your laptop, normally most vendors will equip your laptop with 2 Gb of RAM. There even some vendors who only give you 1 Gb which is terrible. Windows 7 needs at least 1 Gb of RAM to operates optimally, therefore more RAM is needed for your applications. There also performance RAM that have faster 'memory clock' that can enhance your laptop performance. Typical RAM normally have either 1066 Mhz or 1333 Mhz clock speed, but nowadays we can find up to 1866 Mhz, and surprisingly most laptop can support it due to the enhanced technology. Do yourself a favor, save some money and upgrades your RAM.

2. Use an SSD rather than slower HDD

Once you go SSD, you'll forgot what is HDD.
If you wonder what is SSD & HDD, click here.
Basically, your laptop performance will increase tremendously when you use SSD. Start up time will be shorten, literally no loading wait, improved response, faster files search, and reduced errors. Apart from that, SSD allow your laptop to be more silent, produce less heat and your battery will last longer. As SSD price keep dropping nowadays, it is a good choice if performance really matter for you. Cheapest SSD will cost you around RM380++. Better start saving some money, man.

3. This is the era of 64 bit! 32 bit? No, thank you.

Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit
Apart from the famous confusing choices of Windows 7 editions (Home Premium, Ultimate, Professional etc.), actually windows also comes in 32-bit and 64 bit.What? Basically they are the terms used to describes how the processor handles the information. The 64 bit processor handles large amount of random data more efficient than 32 bit. Again, what? To be short, 64 bit is way better. Using 64 bit allows you to use more than 4 Gb of RAM. With 32 bit windows, the maximum amount of RAM that can be used is 3.25 Gb while 64 bit will allow you to use up to 32 Gb of RAM. Most new laptop can use 64 bit variants of Windows 7. So, what are you waiting for? To check whether you are using 32 bit or 64 bit, right click on My Computer then select Properties.

Coming soon:
1. Tips & Tricks - I have no money and I want to make my laptop faster.
2. More on RAM and how you can achieve better performance with it.
3. Laptop cooler, do we really need it?

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