Core i7 - A bit on the slow side

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bigal_nz

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# 36877 3-Jul-2009 03:09

Hi Guys,

I recently updated to a Corei7 from my trusty old Athlon 3500+.

I got:

ASUS P6T SE mobo
Core i7 2.66Ghz
1x2Gb of Corsair DDR3 ram (yer I know I know, but I had a spare stick lying around and cash is tight, I will get 3 sticks soon)

I have 3xSeagate SATA drives. Just standard 7200.11 Barracudas.

Now I reloaded Windows XP, and sure the computer went faster, but not as fast as I had expected. It still takes a while to boot and occasionally really still makes noises like its working hard.

I have begun to wonder if I have done something wrong? Any ideas?

Also could XP not be using the system to its full potential? If so I may go the whole hog and migrate to it fully - ATM I am just booting a small partition on Win7 and have not loaded much onto it.

Talk to me people!!

Cheers

-Al

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544 posts

Ultimate Geek

# 230550 3-Jul-2009 07:17

bigal_nz:

I have begun to wonder if I have done something wrong? Any ideas?

Yes! You haven't put another 2 sticks of DDR3 in it yet!

bigal_nz

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# 230563 3-Jul-2009 08:10

Yeah, I admitted that in my first post, bt hey i7 processors are expensive - will fix that when I can :-)

garvani

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# 230574 3-Jul-2009 08:30

I dont know what you were expecting? a super computer? a pc that will boot into windows in 5 seconds flat? The i7 isnt the be all end all in cpus, its still only a 2.6ghz processor (quite a fast one at that but still) Xp is a 7 year old operating system with literally countless amounts of patches, all this equates to a dog of an OS, and yes xp dosnt do multicores very well either. If you moved to windows seven fulltime you would notice a big difference in performance over xp. However your ram and hard drives are going to hold you back on that front too. Velociraptors are the way to go with an i7

bigal_nz

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# 230579 3-Jul-2009 09:02

garvani: I dont know what you were expecting? a super computer? a pc that will boot into windows in 5 seconds flat? The i7 isnt the be all end all in cpus, its still only a 2.6ghz processor

No but I did expect a more tangeable gain, given that I am making quite a large jump in processor. With all those cores I had hoped that while my system was starting up I would be able to start doing things more quickly - while its still starting up.

garvani: If you moved to windows seven fulltime you would notice a big difference in performance over xp. However your ram and hard drives are going to hold you back on that front too. Velociraptors are the way to go with an i7

Thats exactly the sort of info I wanted to know. Sounds like W7 is the way to go. Thanks for the tip on the velociraptors too.

-Al

Adamal

544 posts

Ultimate Geek

# 230637 3-Jul-2009 11:36

Nahh, go SSD for the OS drive. Keep the other drives for storage.

You've gone a large jump, yes, but with only one stick of RAM, it's like having a twin turbo Viper while running space saver spare tyres on the back!

You'll notice the difference once you're running Triple Channel.

Ragnor

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# 230655 3-Jul-2009 12:55

Hard drive speed is likely holding you back. A faster cpu isn't going to help much if disk speed is holding back you system.

Ram has already been mentioned, but triple channel will help also.

bigal_nz

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# 230657 3-Jul-2009 13:01

I would love SSD, but even a 60Gig is pretty ouch.

Adamal

544 posts

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# 230659 3-Jul-2009 13:12

You also need to be weary of some of them out there. Most of them say they will be able to do X amount of transfer reading and writing, but when put under the microscope, the amount of IO operations they do is pathetic, which has a huge hit on performance.

Mine is an OCZ Core V2, and it offers very good performance for the price. They are very well supported on their website as well. They frequently browse places like Newegg, and if people report problems, they'll repond on there, giving them directions to particular threads in their support forums.

It may pay to hold back a bit for at least a few months. Don't be surprised if theres a terrabyte one out in a few months, and the speeds keep getting a lot better. They're really starting to advance with them.

bigal_nz

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# 230665 3-Jul-2009 13:20

Yes, I think I read on Toms Hardware that Intel are about to announce some new ones. I would probably buy a intel one, or perhaps a OCZ if they are as good as you say.

What OS/Specs are you running? How long it take you to boot?

Ilmarin

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# 230672 3-Jul-2009 13:25

Stay tuned for Intel's 34nm SSDs due out shortly... pundits (myself included) are crossing fingers for lower $/GB. Prices may come down even further by Christmas as production ramps up and yields hopefully improve. I'll be considering replacing my 150GB OS partition (on a Seagate 7200.11) with one when the price dips below NZD $5/GB, although I'm not holding my breath for that happening in 2009.

Adamal

544 posts

Ultimate Geek

# 230676 3-Jul-2009 13:36

bigal_nz:
What OS/Specs are you running? How long it take you to boot?

3ghz Core 2 Duo @ 3.6Ghz
4GB DDR2-1066
HD4870
Windows 7 RC1

Not sure how long it takes actually, I seldom power my machine down. But most stuff is really quick. Outlook opens like BAM! A lot of stuff is like that. The main point of an SSD is the low access time of the drives.

Eg, my RAID0 consisting of 2 Seagate 1TB's has an access time of 14ms, where as my SSD is .2ms. The difference is noticable!

Also, is it 'big al' or 'bi gal'?

bigal_nz

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# 230680 3-Jul-2009 13:41

yep - that sounds pretty sweet

bigal_nz

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# 230685 3-Jul-2009 13:46

bigal_nz: yep - that sounds pretty sweet

It used to be bi gal, but sorry I am strictly a carpet muncher now ;-)

paradoxsm

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# 230720 3-Jul-2009 15:20

:-P lolz.

I upgraded my ailing AMD 3800 to a 6000+ and got quite a substantial improvement, I'm intending to run this into the ground now and buy a decent laptop next time around.

Adamal

544 posts

Ultimate Geek

# 230736 3-Jul-2009 15:40

bigal_nz:
bigal_nz: yep - that sounds pretty sweet

It used to be bi gal, but sorry I am strictly a carpet muncher now ;-)

Really? I prefer hardwood floors over carpet. IF ya know what I mean.

Was just wondering anyway, I thought it was 'Big Al' hahah

Anyway, your first problem to resolve is the RAM. Hard drives are a bottleneck to an extent. Once stuff is thrown in to RAM, you're limiting the speed at which that data can be accessed at by only having a single channel of memory.
You'll notice more of an improvement from getting more RAM and going triple channel than you will with getting faster HDD's.

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