My sister's laptop

[yoco]

Hey guys! So my sister bought a new HP laptop for herself.
The specs are: i5 2,66Ghz, 4GB ram, 500GB HDD, Radeon HD6 (I don't know which card is exactly, I know it's from series 6).
I have a few questions:
- can laptop performance compare to desktop ones?
- W7 were already installed. should I leave automatic updates on?
- can it be overclocked? I looked in Bios, but couldn't find anything about frequencies and such
- I installed two games just for fun. First one was Dirt 2. When I reached the game menu it was completely unresponsive. Picture was barely moving. Then I tried with NFS: Shift. When I got into gameplay barely responsive! Shouldn't these two games play at least a bit?
- I have a few more questions, but can't remember them all now, gonna write them later

[takomania]

-first of all, this is a laptop gfx card benchmark chart - i should bookmark it really, because it's very useful -=> Mobile Graphics Cards - Benchmark List - Notebookcheck.net Tech

-laptop vs desktop performance = depends what you're using it for - games? no. video/image/av editing (high end)? no.

-nothing wrong with win7 auto updates - what version of windows 7 did it come with though? there's a comparison chart here to check out the differences -=> Compare Windows - Microsoft Windows

-overclocking depends on the manufacturer.

-no, those games won't play out of the box (perfectly), but there are many laptop gaming sites around (mostly forums) where people post gfx/texture/directx hacks to allow newer games to run on laptops.

hope this helps a little

[ParamouR]

Firstly congrats from my side to your sister on purchasing a new HP Laptop, I'm sure her money is not wasted. I'm also a proud HP Laptop owner

- Of-course you can compare Laptops with Desktops upto certain extends. Since laptops are meant to be portable which makes it be less of weight and easy to carry unlike PC which are little heavy.
- Windows Automatic updates I would say switch it off since it saves some amount of memory and increase the speed upto some extent and do an update whenever you are live on the net maybe once a week or so.
- Never overclock laptops its Ok to over-clock your PC but when it comes to Laptops they tend to behave unfair and might be costlier to repair its parts once it gets bricked due to overclocking. Repairing a PC even a intermediate lame can do.
- Before playing games and using other big applications remember to install/update your drivers. Installing your drives would considerably increase your games performances well as the over-all computer use-age.
Looking at your sisters Laptop specs I can guarantee that those games are supported on her system and could play considerable good if all the required installations are done which I mentioned earlier.

-_Feel free to PM me if you have any more computer related questions.

[anon]

- W7 were already installed.

It is likely that the install is full of programs you'll never use and only eat disk space and resources. When I received my netbook I almost had a heart attack after opening the Task Manager - right after boot-up there were already 50+ processes using 75% of available memory.

You could try to "decrapify" it yourself, but it's much better to take note of which drivers you need and then just reinstall Windows 7 from scratch. You could use Master Razor's custom edition (send him a PM to get the links) or even Microsoft's official release - even that will be lighter than most preinstalled OSes. Do however make a backup of the current install (unless the laptop came with a recovery or factory reset disc) in case you ever need to go back for whatever reason.

As for gaming, generally that's a no-no on laptops, and you should definitely forget about it if the graphics card is actually an integrated chipset. Gaming-capable laptops (called "desktop replacements") do exist, though, but I don't know if your sister's is one. My advice would be to google the model name and see what people have to say about it.

[takomania]

with regards to what anon mentioned about the win7 installation, as long as you have a valid license, you could easily lay your hands on the exact same version of windows online, and use your legit license key to register/activate.

that's only necessary if the manufacturer has not provided you with clean installation disks - many companies now only bundle those restore discs which install windows plus all the junk the vendor bundled with it...

[yoco]

And how can I see this license key? I didn't get any kind of disc with laptop.
Any yea @anon, process are way to much, over 90 currently. The thing is since I don't know a thing about W7 I don't wanna mess something up, that's way I left everything as it is.
And I didn't really expect it be a game machine!

[anon]

And how can I see this license key? I didn't get any kind of disc with laptop.

Try this:
Win keyfinder Product Key Finder For Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, and MS Office 2000, MS Office XP, MS Office 2007, MS Office 2010

Any yea @anon, process are way to much, over 90 currently.

90!? That's extreme.

[seldom]

You could try to "decrapify" it yourself

or use this free tool: Download | The PC Decrapifier

When I received my netbook I almost had a heart attack after opening the Task Manager - right after boot-up there were already 50+ processes using 75% of available memory.

I hear you, anon! The same here. I was just wondering if there is a list somewhere of what can be taken out safely.

[anon]

I hear you, anon! The same here. I was just wondering if there is a list somewhere of what can be taken out safely.

This guy knows what he's talking about. You can set half of Windows 7's default services to either disabled or manual without problems.

[seldom]

Thank you for reminding! Black Viper has been around for awhile... I remember, when the site was down, I really missed him!

[nothingbutupload]

Most of the time a stock laptop will not let you overclock. Sorry.

[yoco]

90!? That's extreme.

Tell me about it!

Try this:
Win keyfinder Product Key Finder For Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, and MS Office 2000, MS Office XP, MS Office 2007, MS Office 2010

or use this free tool: Download | The PC Decrapifier

Gonna check these two links!
I know there's a bunch of HP software on it, not to mention other stuff!

[cheatos]

I'll try to help you to solve the gaming problem,

Radeon HD6 (I don't know which card is exactly, I know it's from series 6).

Do this:
Start -> Run -> Type "dxdiag" without the quotes -> Select the "Display" tab
and tell us the full name of the card.

- I installed two games just for fun. First one was Dirt 2. When I reached the game menu it was completely unresponsive. Picture was barely moving. Then I tried with NFS: Shift. When I got into gameplay barely responsive! Shouldn't these two games play at least a bit?

A Radeon 6 Series is considered "new" and should be able to run them with some speeds (Sure a laptop Radeon is slower than a desktop equivalent) but you say non-responsive ?!, this is strange.
Did you tweak the settings ? (Graphics options to Medium or Low)

Also Updating drivers could help:
AMD Graphics Drivers & Software

---
Finally, I agree paramour, never overclock the laptop and I doubt you can anyway

[yoco]

I'll try to help you to solve the gaming problem,



Do this:
Start -> Run -> Type "dxdiag" without the quotes -> Select the "Display" tab
and tell us the full name of the card.

It's HD6370

A Radeon 6 Series is considered "new" and should be able to run them with some speeds (Sure a laptop Radeon is slower than a desktop equivalent) but you say non-responsive ?!, this is strange.
Did you tweak the settings ? (Graphics options to Medium or Low)

Also Updating drivers could help:
AMD Graphics Drivers & Software

---
Finally, I agree paramour, never overclock the laptop and I doubt you can anyway

Gonna update next week when she gets internet.
And I honestly wouldn't even try to overclock it, she'd probably murder me if something went wrong!

[seldom]

Found the following, looks useful:

Windows startup programs. What are they? Are they required? How can I disable them?

Sysinfo.org