Calling All Computer Geeks!

[melayneseahawk]

Help! Have a question.

Fifth is running Vista Basic on a Celeron M processor (430 @ 1.73GHz) with 502 MB of RAM and a 32-bit operating system. It is less than a month old.

So, tell me: why does it lock up? why is there a keyboard delay? why does it freeze and run like molasses and why does it suck?

Obviously, I'm having computer trouble.

So, because I can't deal with this right now, memes:

Your Personality is the Rarest (INFJ)

Your personality type is introspective, principled, self critical, and sensitive. Only about 2% of all people have your personality - including 3% of all women and around 1% of all men. You are Introverted, Intuitive, Feeling, and Judging.

How Rare Is Your Personality?

You Are A Romantic Realist

You tend to be grounded when it comes to romance. Sure, you can fall hard... but only for someone you've gotten to know. And once you're in love, you can be a total romantic goofball... But you'd never admit it to your friends!

Are You Romantic or Realistic?

What Be Your Nerd Type? Your Result: Social Nerd   You're interested in things such as politics, psychology, child care, and peace. I wouldn't go so far as to call you a hippie, but some of you may be tree-huggers. You're the type of people who are interested in bettering the world. You're possible the least nerdy of them all; unless you participate in other activies that paled your nerdiness compared to your involvement in social activities. Whatever the case, we could still use more of you around. ^_^
Drama Nerd
Musician
Literature Nerd
Gamer/Computer Nerd
Artistic Nerd
Anime Nerd
Science/Math Nerd
What Be Your Nerd Type? Quizzes for MySpace

Comments

[jaiwithani.livejournal.com]

Vista loves to eat resources. Also freedom and babies. Your specs are on the low-end of Vistaness. Unfortunately, since Vista is not XP and I'm off the Windows train, I can't give you good advice on what to turn off to make it faster.

[melayneseahawk.livejournal.com]

Ugh, that's what I'd thought. Thanks, though.

(I believe Gateway is going to get a call...after a place a very unhappy one to my father who picked out the damned thing.)

[jaiwithani.livejournal.com]

It might also be that you're running too many other things, or one or more things have bugs that make them slow on Vista. Was it slow when you got it?

[melayneseahawk.livejournal.com]

Yup.

It goes in and out of being slow, though.

[ibneko.livejournal.com]

Meh, yeah, you're definitely at the minimum requirements (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/editions/systemrequirements.mspx) for Vista. From the reviews I've read of Vista, at least 1 GB of RAM (http://www.bit-tech.net/bits/2007/01/30/Windows_Vista_review/4.html) is recommended, if not two (http://www.betanews.com/article/Vista_Minimum_Requirements_Unrealistic/1165596677), preferably more. And a decent graphics card was also recommended... Although, I really can't say - I haven't upgraded to Vista, despite having the graphics card, a GB of RAM, and a AMD Athlon 64 3700+ (2.4 GHz) processor (yay homebrew systems for $400-500~) - but then again, it's currently acting as a server, so downtime is bad...

But disabling any pretty graphics effects may help (no, I don't know how...), or downgrading to XP (don't know how to do that either...). The quickest way would probably be to contact the person/people/store that sold you the machine and bitch them out. Or make them try to use the machine. :D

[melayneseahawk.livejournal.com]

Heh, it turns out that because of the video card (which requires 10 MB off the top) my dear machine doesn't have enough RAM to run Vista (it wants at least 512, and can only see 502 on my machine). They'll sell me more RAM, but I "should have known".

I'm in the mood to kill people.

[ibneko.livejournal.com]

Heh. Yeah, the 502 number was kinda wierd. But there's not really that much of a difference between 512 and 502. Although the taking-of-RAM-by-video-card is kinda odd though. Am suspecting you have an onboard video processor, and not actually a seperate card - decent cards should come with their own RAM (VRAM) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_card#Video_memory). Onboard video processors = usually lousy (I think) and may not be able to support the necessary graphic prettiness that Vista demands. Which means that the processor ends up doing all of the work, leaving even less system resources for other things.

And unless you don't have someone to do it for you, I'd suggest shopping around for RAM yourself, once you figure out what sort you need. Buying from the place you got your computer from is typically more expensive (ie, from Apple, a stick of 1 GB for my laptop was about $300-400. But I was able to get it online for around $100-150). And an low-end video card that let me play playstation 2 games with an emulator costed around $30 after rebates and google coupons~

[melayneseahawk.livejournal.com]

Prettiness-wise I'm fine, it's just the locking up. I'm going to try to convince Dad to shop around...once he's talking to me again.

(Oh, did I mention that I met a guy that's a lot like you in one of my classes, who gave me the idea to check the RAM counts in the first place? He's go the same name as you, too!)

[ibneko.livejournal.com]

Well, graphics processor wouldn't affect how pretty it might look, but more of how slower your computer might have to run, if it has to devote extra (main) processor cycles to graphics stuff...

Oooh, a not-me me~

[melayneseahawk.livejournal.com]

*shrugs* Dunno. I'm just more concerned with getting it to stop locking up.

Plus, Vista and WoW fight over the RAM and I can't play! *whines*

[ibneko.livejournal.com]

Hahahaha. You don't need WoW~ =^_____^= It an evil, horrible, terrible soul-sucking game. ::grumbles at his addicted roommate:: Although then again, that might just be because he has lousy priorities and isn't too observant about the passage of time... (Roommate: "Woah, I just spent 12 hours on WoW again..." Ben: *facepalm*)

[melayneseahawk.livejournal.com]

I only play for short spans, and not even every day. I'm not obsessed, but now is one of those times when I want to kill things. A lot.

[ibneko.livejournal.com]

*do it for you
it = install. =^^=
Uh. And I just realized that most of what I'm saying applies to desktops. So this is a laptop... uh... yeah. I dunno.

[melayneseahawk.livejournal.com]

If I'm installing it, Da and I can probably sort it out. But thanks!

[4ti3k4t35.livejournal.com]

Yeah, you're trying to run Vista on half a gig of RAM. Which is laughable. I would seriously suggest uninstalling Vista and using XP or *nix, or adding another half a gig of RAM to your laptop. Probably cost about $60-$100. I'm guessing. :P

[melayneseahawk.livejournal.com]

Situation's already sorted out (see post I'll be making in a few minutes), but I'm going with the latter.

[4ti3k4t35.livejournal.com]

I don't know what people were thinking, putting Vista on laptops with only half a gig of RAM. That's just absurd. Vista barely works with 1 GB of RAM, looks decent with 2 GB, and actually works with 3+ GB. But half a gig? Stuuuuupid.

Good luck with your laptop, though. I hope it behaves with more RAM. :P