Trying to update an old laptop - some questions

spaceboy

OK my youngest daughter was given an old Sony Viao laptop from about 2009 I think. It seems a solid enough bit of kit and she uses it for playing Roblox and things like that. However it is very slow to start up. It uses DDR2 RAM and has 2 x 2GB of that. It also has a normal HDD. 

I looked on AliExpress and found 2 x 4GB DDR2 RAM for about £30 (4GB sticks of DDR2 seem to be very expensive, I guess it was rare back in the day). The current DDR2 is PC6400 and I'm wondering if PC5300 DDR2 would be ok in it as that's all I can find at a reasonable price for 4GB sticks.

Also I'm thinking SSDs are very cheap now so I could get one for about £12. But do you think an SSD with a DRAM cache would be beneficial for this laptop?

Note - it has Windows 10 installed.

Neil_Jones

PC5300 will work but it will "slow" the 6400 memory to match the speed.  There won't be a lot of difference you'll notice though.

SSDs - the older the laptop the less benefit you get from these as the limitation is the chipset of the main board.  It may boot up faster and use less power overall and be generally more responsive but if its a standard 2.5" unit you can reuse it again later.

mark55man

if your daughter is just using a browser why not try a lightweight Linux distro.  About 5 years ago I did the same with my Sony Viao.  On recommendation from very Linux savvy friend I used MINT - I am sure others are available now I'm a bit out of touch.  If you were minded to try you could partition the disk so you didn't lose the windows access.  Simpler but possibly more hassly I think you can boot linux from a USB so you don't even have to much about with installing software just buying a pre loaded USB from ebay for £20 or so. 

spaceboy

This is the RAM I'm considering. It says "for AMD" in the title, do you think it will be ok with an Intell Core2Duo?

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004625750934.html?spm=a2g0o.cart.0.0.378738dakLGjx2&mp=1

Bonhomie

Better to give the full model number of the laptop. Always very irritating when people don't do this in the first place.

Bonhomie

spaceboy said:

This is the RAM I'm considering. It says "for AMD" in the title, do you think it will be ok with an Intell Core2Duo?

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004625750934.html?spm=a2g0o.cart.0.0.378738dakLGjx2&mp=1

No........

spaceboy

Bonhomie said:

spaceboy said:

This is the RAM I'm considering. It says "for AMD" in the title, do you think it will be ok with an Intell Core2Duo?

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004625750934.html?spm=a2g0o.cart.0.0.378738dakLGjx2&mp=1

No........

Ah. Does AMD need different RAM?

Bonhomie

Forget about the RAM and just fit an SSD. Don't understand the point of theoretical stories about a diminished benefit when what you wanted is it to boot faster in the first place. Why you would care if you get a maximum read speed of 300 MB/s instead of 500 MB/s? The fact is that it will be a significant improvement over what you have now, especially with a clean install. It's not about the highest throughput, but also IOPS etc

spaceboy

Bonhomie said:

Better to give the full model number of the laptop. Always very irritating when people don't do this in the first place.

Sony Vaio VGN-FW56E

• Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo T6600 (2.2GHz)
• RAM: 4GB (2x2GB)
• Hard Drive: 500GB
• Operating System: Microsoft Window 7 Home Premium (Now Windows 10)
• Screen: 16.4" HD Screen
• Optical Drive: Blu-ray Combo Drive
• Graphics: ATI Radeon HD 4570 - 512MB
• Bluetooth: Yes
• Notebook Camera: Yes

Bonhomie

My advice would be to save spending money on next to useless RAM and to spend more on an SSD with DRAM.

spaceboy

Bonhomie said:

My advice would be to save spending money on next to useless RAM and to spend more on an SSD with DRAM.

Thanks. It looks like you're right as the RAM upgrade is ridiculously expensive anyway.

One thing I was just wondering is would a graphics card upgrade be beneficial? I suspect the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5730 might be a direct replacement and has double the onboard RAM.


*actually on checking prices on ebay they seem to be about £40-£50 which isnt great.