Laptop Ram & Hard drive upgrade questions/assistance

LanceC09

Active member
Hello, im looking into upgrading the ram and hard drive of my laptop.
I am a novice with this so please correct me if im wrong on anything.

I just got a new game (Gate Of Hell Ostfront) and the load times are about 2/3 minutes while playing. In multiplayer majority of other players load within 30 seconds, To my understanding if i upgrade the ram and hard drive the load times would be a lot more faster.



RAM
I believe it has room for two sticks of ram and i dont know how much to upgrade by.

Is it acceptable to mix ram sizes, example being put in a stick of 16GB with the 8 already there to have 24GB.

I believe the CPU supports up to 32GB, should I get two 16GB for a total of 32 or one for 32GB, is there a benefit to have one or two sticks of ram?

With installing it is it just plug it in then you're good to go?


Hard Drive
I dont know whether to just get a M.2 SSD drive and place my games on that, or get I believe a 2.5 SSD and clone everything from my HDD to the SSD which I can then speed up the whole laptop.

I believe with cloning everything to the SSD I would have to use a usb cable and cloning attachments, and then replace the HDD with the SSD in the laptop after the clone.
If this was done would there be anything else to do?

Also could I then place the HDD as the 2nd storage drive and set an option to back everything up to the HDD in case the SSD fails in the future, instead of selling or having the it collect dust in storage?






Finally would these be simple upgrades, as I've never taken it apart and pay someone else to clean it and apply thermal paste, and does anyone recommend any brands for the upgrades.





Chassis & Display
Vortex Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-4710MQ (2.50GHz) 6MB
Memory (RAM)
8GB Kingston SODIMM DDR3 1600MHz (1 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 880M - 8.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 11
1st Storage Drive
750GB WD BLACK 2.5" WD7500BPKX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
Power Cable
1 x UK Power Lead & 230W AC Adaptor
Battery
Vortex 17.3" Series 8 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (5,200 mAh/76.96WH)
 

Bhuna50

Author Level
If you log into your PCS account there is an Upgrade button on the right hand side

1632674461792.png


this then takes you to a menu of options relating to your order / laptop and you can see what drives / upgrades are available and copatible with your machine.

RAM is best purchased as a pair and yes, you will see clips near the slot that automatically lock around the RAM as you push it in - these will obviously have to be slightly unclipped to remove your existing RAM.

M2 SSD would be faster usually.

Again - the upgrade section would help show you if you can just buy an additional drive for the laptop or whether you would have to replace the drive.

If replacing, then you might as well start off with a clean install of Windows rather than have the hassle of cloning. Although obviously transfer any files you want across.

You could then buy a USB caddy for your existing drive and use it as a USB drive anyway.
 

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
Hello, im looking into upgrading the ram and hard drive of my laptop.
I am a novice with this so please correct me if im wrong on anything.

I just got a new game (Gate Of Hell Ostfront) and the load times are about 2/3 minutes while playing. In multiplayer majority of other players load within 30 seconds, To my understanding if i upgrade the ram and hard drive the load times would be a lot more faster.



RAM
I believe it has room for two sticks of ram and i dont know how much to upgrade by.

Is it acceptable to mix ram sizes, example being put in a stick of 16GB with the 8 already there to have 24GB.

I believe the CPU supports up to 32GB, should I get two 16GB for a total of 32 or one for 32GB, is there a benefit to have one or two sticks of ram?

With installing it is it just plug it in then you're good to go?


Hard Drive
I dont know whether to just get a M.2 SSD drive and place my games on that, or get I believe a 2.5 SSD and clone everything from my HDD to the SSD which I can then speed up the whole laptop.

I believe with cloning everything to the SSD I would have to use a usb cable and cloning attachments, and then replace the HDD with the SSD in the laptop after the clone.
If this was done would there be anything else to do?

Also could I then place the HDD as the 2nd storage drive and set an option to back everything up to the HDD in case the SSD fails in the future, instead of selling or having the it collect dust in storage?






Finally would these be simple upgrades, as I've never taken it apart and pay someone else to clean it and apply thermal paste, and does anyone recommend any brands for the upgrades.





Chassis & Display
Vortex Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-4710MQ (2.50GHz) 6MB
Memory (RAM)
8GB Kingston SODIMM DDR3 1600MHz (1 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 880M - 8.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 11
1st Storage Drive
750GB WD BLACK 2.5" WD7500BPKX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
Power Cable
1 x UK Power Lead & 230W AC Adaptor
Battery
Vortex 17.3" Series 8 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (5,200 mAh/76.96WH)
Firstly, that laptop won't take an M2 drive, it was before their time and doesn't have the connectivity. It has an old mSATA port, but these offer no benefit over a standard 2.5" SATA which is more reliable anyway as mSATA never had much support.

An SSD will certainly improve load times, and upping to 16Gb RAM will also make an improvement, but your CPU is going to be holding you back quite significantly also, that laptop is well past it's prime and making amendments to it may make a little improvement, but really you need to think about getting something new.

But anyway, something like a Samsung 860 Evo 2.5" SSD would be a worthwhile investment, they're excellent performing drives and very reliable also.

And yes, you could move your HDD to the secondary bay and have that as a data drive (I have the same chassis and have that setup).

You definitely don't need 32Gb, it wouldn't offer any benefit over 16Gb as the game doesn't use any more than that according to the spec requirements on Steam. But you would ideally want to buy 2 x 8Gb 1600MHz DDR3 SODIMMs @1.5V, in my personal opinion, the corsair vengeance is the stuff to go for. With RAM you want matched pairs rather than having singles different specs, so it's best to buy a 2 x 8Gb pair.

DDR3 is now a niche product because it was end of life quite a few years ago, as such you'll pay a premium for it.

As I said, I have the same chassis, this appears the best value atm, the other options all appear to be double the cost


Ignore when it says about 2nd and 3rd gen Intels only being compatible, RAM is RAM, doesn't matter what processor it's pairing with, but the motherboard.
 
Last edited:

LanceC09

Active member
Looking at the configurator for upgrades I do not have the choice for purchasing any internal HD only external.

However in the detailed specification part it shows.

MEMORY
Number of Modules 4 (I believe this is 4 slots for ram)
Maximum Supported Memory 32GB
HARD DRIVE CAPACITY
Hard Drive Type 2 x 9.5mm 2.5" S-ATA Hard Drive Support





1632677448688.png


On this image it states that 4 is Primary HDD compartment. This doesn't mean that the it cant have an SSD for primary right?

Is the cloning process difficult and a pain? Reason why I thought of doing that was I dont fully know how to do a fresh install as I did the free online upgrade to windows 10 from windows 7 if that makes any difference, because of this confusion with register keys etc I thought the easier option is to clone.



I have looked into getting an upgrade with a desktop, though I cant spend that amount of money right now so I thought I would upgrade it.

Main reason why i thought of 32GB Ram is sometimes i do a bit of 3D modeling, though I feel ill just go with 16GB to save money a bit more.

Referencing to the image again are all the ram slots together, so I only have to open the bottom compartments and not remove the keyboard to open it from the top.

Im nervous as im worried it will blow up in smoke haha.
 

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
On this image it states that 4 is Primary HDD compartment. This doesn't mean that the it cant have an SSD for primary right?
It's any drive, doesn't matter if it's HDD or SSD, they're both the same format.

Is the cloning process difficult and a pain? Reason why I thought of doing that was I dont fully know how to do a fresh install as I did the free online upgrade to windows 10 from windows 7 if that makes any difference, because of this confusion with register keys etc I thought the easier option is to clone.
I wouldn't suggest a clone, if you did an in-place upgrade to Windows 10, then you're system is begging for a clean install a long long time ago. You almost certainly will find that your windows is causing a lot of performance degradation to general performance as well as the drives and RAM.

Clean install is very easy, it takes about 30 minutes with windows 10 and it's something you're going to have to be au fait with with any gaming system, needs to be done once a year really on ever major update.

Use option one from this article and if you have any issues, just post on the forum and we can talk you through it:


Main reason why i thought of 32GB Ram is sometimes i do a bit of 3D modeling, though I feel ill just go with 16GB to save money a bit more.
Oh, in that case 32Gb would be worthwhile then, but I'd suggest not on this laptop, it's a wasted expenditure on out of date stuff, save that money towards and upgraded laptop.
Referencing to the image again are all the ram slots together, so I only have to open the bottom compartments and not remove the keyboard to open it from the top.
There are 2 RAM DIMMS in the number 2 bay, use those. The other two you have to remove the keyboard and are a bit of a pain to access.
Im nervous as im worried it will blow up in smoke haha.
This is part and parcel of a custom laptop, that's why people buy them is that they're serviceable and easily upgradeable. I would strongly recommend getting used to servicing them, you'd have to do something quite drastic to cause any damage, they're very easy to access.
 

LanceC09

Active member
Ok im just about to order the ram and ssd.

The Samsung 860 EVO 500GB (link) is about £30 dearer than I believe the newer faster 870 EVO 500GB (link)
Should I get the 870 EVO?

With the ram im wondering if I should just get one stick of 8GB Kingston (link) since it already has one to save £60.

To have a bit more of an understanding on the process with this upgrade.

Purchase upgrades.
Prepare install of Windows 10 onto USB drive with instructions from the article you provided. Including back up personal files, images, music etc on a separate portable drive.
Remove HDD
Insert new drive and ram.
Turn on laptop and insert USB drive of with Windows install.
Then all updates re download software set up etc
After that insert old HDD in 2nd HD compartment and look into setting it for data back up for fresh install.


Sorry if im being a bit awkward and I really appreciate all the help. :)
 

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
Samsung 860 EVO 500GB (link) is about £30 dearer than I believe the newer faster 870 EVO 500GB (link)
Should I get the 870 EVO?
Oh yes, absolutely, well spotted.


With the ram im wondering if I should just get one stick of 8GB Kingston (link) since it already has one to save £60.
RAM should always be configured in matched pairs as its dual channel for Desktops. If you're using unmatched pairs it has to be exactly the same specs and even then it may well not boot. It's always best to use matched pairs.
Purchase upgrades.
Prepare install of Windows 10 onto USB drive with instructions from the article you provided. Including back up personal files, images, music etc on a separate portable drive.
Remove HDD
Insert new drive and ram.
Turn on laptop and insert USB drive of with Windows install.
Then all updates re download software set up etc
After that insert old HDD in 2nd HD compartment and look into setting it for data back up for fresh install.
Yes, that's exactly right. If you have any difficulty do feel free to post and ask for help.
 

LanceC09

Active member
All appears to have gone great, as it was time to clean it I cleaned it myself and applied fresh thermal paste.

Thanks for the assistance. (y)
 
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