It People

[Guest P-Diddly]

. . . upgrade my PC?

Currently have a new HP Pavilion p6183l (only sold here). Quad core Q8400, but with 4GB RAM, expandable to 16 GB.

Fancy 16GB as so of my 3D stuff is quite big.

How and . . . how much?

[RichB]

to go to 16GB will cost you. You will also need to go to a 64bit operating system - so if you dont already have it, factor in another £100 or so for windows (linux would be free) - or make alternative arrangements...

Doing 3D stuff? Graphics card may be a consideration here.

check out overclockers.co.uk, scan.co.uk, ebuyer.co.uk, and dabs.co.uk

crucial.com might be able to tell you what memory you need, I prefer ocz.

[RichB]

http://www.crucial.com/uk/store/listparts....vilion%20p6183l

According to crucial you only have 2 memory slots, so you are as they say shit out of luck.

Check out the retail links for some decent spec machines with standard retail motherboards which will give much better upgradeability.

Or you could call HP and ask them?

[Bloo Loo]

. . . upgrade my PC?

Currently have a new HP Pavilion p6183l (only sold here). Quad core Q8400, but with 4GB RAM, expandable to 16 GB.

Fancy 16GB as so of my 3D stuff is quite big.

How and . . . how much?

what did I tell you about Pavilion? what did I say? I used to go blue in the face telling people about the different qualities of PC...gave up years ago..no-one listens....they still want Ryanair PCs.

[Guest P-Diddly]

http://www.crucial.com/uk/store/listparts....vilion%20p6183l

According to crucial you only have 2 memory slots, so you are as they say shit out of luck.

Check out the retail links for some decent spec machines with standard retail motherboards which will give much better upgradeability.

Or you could call HP and ask them?

I'll wait for this thing to burn out, like Bloo says, won't be long then get a proper one.

[RichB]

ebuyer do a 4gb module. So you can go to 8GB at least fairly easily.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/154676

Mind you at £200 each, you would be better off spending another 200 and getting a decent pc

[Guest P-Diddly]

ebuyer do a 4gb module. So you can go to 8GB at least fairly easily.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/154676

Mind you at £200 each, you would be better off spending another 200 and getting a decent pc

I thought this stuff was cheap?

An 8gb MicroSD card is only about a tenner now.

Might push the thing to 8gb, it'll do fine.

[Quagmire]

I'm surpised you are managing to use 4 gig really. Are you sure you would make use of it? Whats your system using at the momement?

[moesasji]

I thought this stuff was cheap?

The stuff is cheap IF you stick to components that are very common!!

2GB DDR2 modules are cheap as these are common so it is cheap to populate 4 slots to give 8GB in total (which is the top of what most motherboards support!). The moment you want to go above 8GB it suddenly becomes expensive as you need both rare motherboards and rare memory-modules.

As you apparantly only have two memory-slots it simply is very expensive to put in 8GB and I doubt it would support 16GB!. Cheaper to buy a new decent motherboard with more memory slots + the cheaper modules.

[Guest P-Diddly]

I'm surpised you are managing to use 4 gig really. Are you sure you would make use of it? Whats your system using at the momement?

I have quite big 3D models, site designs and the like. Will have Word, Excel and Powerpoint going and Firefox . . . . all of this at the same time.

I think the issue is with the recent NVIDIA monitor driver update. Killed the laptop then wants to kill this system too.

[Guest P-Diddly]

The stuff is cheap IF you stick to components that are very common!!

2GB DDR2 modules are cheap as these are common so it is cheap to populate 4 slots to give 8GB in total (which is the top of what most motherboards support!). The moment you want to go above 8GB it suddenly becomes expensive as you need both rare motherboards and rare memory-modules.

As you apparantly only have two memory-slots it simply is very expensive to put in 8GB and I doubt it would support 16GB!. Cheaper to buy a new decent motherboard with more memory slots + the cheaper modules.

According to the book, there's 4 slots available. But the RAM is DDR2 with the graphics card thing DDR3.

All over my head now, mush.

[Tin Foil Hat]

Yeah, even Autocad doesn't really suck that much RAM.

Check it out on task manager to see if it really does need more RAM:

So this example is using 2.97 GB at the moment, ignore the red circle I nabbed the image from somewhere else.

[Guest DisposableHeroes]

to go to 16GB will cost you. You will also need to go to a 64bit operating system - so if you dont already have it, factor in another £100 or so for windows (linux would be free) - or make alternative arrangements...

Doing 3D stuff? Graphics card may be a consideration here.

check out overclockers.co.uk, scan.co.uk, ebuyer.co.uk, and dabs.co.uk

crucial.com might be able to tell you what memory you need, I prefer ocz.

Yes, good advice, easy to diy upgrade too.

[moesasji]

According to the book, there's 4 slots available. But the RAM is DDR2 with the graphics card thing DDR3.

That it is DDR2 is good as that is cheap. How many of the slots are actually populated?

Hopefully only 2, in which case it is cheap to plug in an additional two to give you 8GB.

But do by memory from a decent manufacturer (Kingston, A-Data, Crucial, etc) to prevent blue-screens, etc.

@Guagmire: I do really use 8GB in my case, although that is under linux. Essentially the memory is used to prevent reads/writes to and from files (as the harddisk is by far the slowest component in your system).

*) Note that the 8GB advice assumes you have an operating-system that is capable of addressing >4GB. Most consumer versions of windows can however only address 4BG in 32-bit, see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa366778(VS.85).aspx

[indirectapproach]

Anyone care to pass a comment on an apple mac book pro?

[The Masked Tulip]

I doubt you will benefit form 16 GB to be honest.

1. Is your 3D software capable of using 16GB.

2. Is your OS capable of using 16GB - might have to upgrade to 64-bit Windows.

3. If you upgrade to 64-bit Windows will you need to buy a 64-bit version of your 3D software. Does a 64-bit version of the 3D software exist.

You might be better off going for a RAID system for your disk drives and RAIDing them so they read/write at the best performance that suits you, buying disk drives with a big Cache, better graphics cards to off-load graphics from CPU, etc, etc.

I used to buy the latest bells and whistles, and pay the price, but quickly learnt it is a mug's game - what is state of the art today will be so so in 12 months so, IMPO, the most economical way forward is to buy what is so so and change it every 2 years.

[cashinmattress]

For the price you are looking at with 16Gig of ram, you'd be better off spending a little bit more and getting a new Mobo + I7 + DDR3 ram. My system is that and with a GTX 280, a raptor hard drive plus the ram I have runs at 2000mhz. There is only 3 gigs in this machine mind you, running on Vista 32bit. Any more would require the jump to 64 bit OS, but its not worth the money as non of the apps I use have 64bit instruction.

BTW my machine runs like a rocket.

[Guest P-Diddly]

I doubt you will benefit form 16 GB to be honest.

1. Is your 3D software capable of using 16GB.

2. Is your OS capable of using 16GB - might have to upgrade to 64-bit Windows.

3. If you upgrade to 64-bit Windows will you need to buy a 64-bit version of your 3D software. Does a 64-bit version of the 3D software exist.

You might be better off going for a RAID system for your disk drives and RAIDing them so they read/write at the best performance that suits you, buying disk drives with a big Cache, better graphics cards to off-load graphics from CPU, etc, etc.

I used to buy the latest bells and whistles, and pay the price, but quickly learnt it is a mug's game - what is state of the art today will be so so in 12 months so, IMPO, the most economical way forward is to buy what is so so and change it every 2 years.

What's a RAID system, Tulip?

[Guest DisposableHeroes]

What's a RAID system, Tulip?

It's to do with the hard disks in your pc. There are different types of raid:

Basically it can speed up the performance of your pc's hard disk or be used for redundancy, just in case a hard disk fails (not a problem if you regularly backup). I guess if your 3D modelings are large files it may help the performance a bit. As said by another poster however, by far your biggest performance upgrade would be a good graphics card.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

This explains it well, especially the table.

Right I'm back outside on my bike, too nice to be inside...No wind, sun...lovely!

[Bloo Loo]

http://www.crucial.com/uk/index.aspx

try this site, they have a ram detector package....will tell you what you need and how much..its safe...ive used it several times and not lost my blueness once.

[Guest P-Diddly]

It's to do with the hard disks in your pc. There are different types of raid:

Basically it can speed up the performance of your pc's hard disk or be used for redundancy, just in case a hard disk fails (not a problem if you regularly backup). I guess if your 3D modelings are large files it may help the performance a bit. As said by another poster however, by far your biggest performance upgrade would be a good graphics card.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

This explains it well, especially the table.

Right I'm back outside on my bike, too nice to be inside...No wind, sun...lovely!

Way over my head, mush. Is it a program you run or is it hardware?

Looking at the label on the side of this PC it says, NVIDIA Geforce GT220 with 1GB of discrete DDR3 video memory. Is this sh!t?

[Three Pint Princess 2]

Some of the popular 3d programs have GPU support now.

[Guest P-Diddly]

Some of the popular 3d programs have GPU support now.

I'm talking about SketchUp.

What's GPU?

[LazyPeon]

No, no,

is a RAID array!

[The Masked Tulip]

Way over my head, mush. Is it a program you run or is it hardware?

Looking at the label on the side of this PC it says, NVIDIA Geforce GT220 with 1GB of discrete DDR3 video memory. Is this sh!t?

You can have RAID software support in Windows Server but it is not as good as going for a good hardware RAID solution. In the 'old days' this meant buying an expensive RAID card but nowadays these can be get for tens of pounds instead of thousands. Or, many moherboards, come with on-board RAID support.

I am an IPTV Consultant by profession and have done a lot of work with 3D studios and also for myself at home. Most 3Ders will have a RAID solutions that combines a mix of speed improvement with redudancy often using a dedicated RAID card to stick into one of your PC slots. They usually then have a good dedicated 3D rendering card which off-loads the work of the CPU and off you go.

Bear in mind that setting up a RAID solution - called initialising - destroys all the data on the hard drives so you have to set up a RAID solution BEFORE you install Windows, any software and any data.

Here is a link to RAID cards:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/productlist....01&catid=49

In theory, if you have 3 or more drives in a RAID solution your data is spread across all three drives meaning that if one drives fails you are able to replace it and your data is still there because the RAID has stored your data on the other two drives and hence it then rebuilds yours data across all 3 drives. This, however, is no excuse for not having a good back-up solution.

I have set up and rebuilt numerous complex RAID solutions and each time I have had to replace a dead drive there is always a question about whether the RAID has worked or not. It, touc wood, always has but it can be nerve-racking.

CPU is central processor unit which is the main Quad Intel chip that you have in your PC.

GPU is graphical processor unit which is the chip on the VGA graphics card.

Someone like you should be using GPU/VGA card that has a GPU that knows how to off-load the 3D stuff, such as rendering, from the CPU. To be fair, most do nowadays but you can still pay a bit more and get ones that dramatically improve your rendering and 3D modelling capabilities.

Most 3D software will actually have a list of recommended GPU/VGA cards.