or Connect
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

What upgrades for basic M6400?

post #1 of 7
Thread Starter 
I just received a M6400 as a replacement for my damaged M90 and other than it having the 4GB of memory it's the most basic configuration. Harddrive is only 150GB.

It'll be used for some internet stuff, some gaming and at times at work running UG-NX.

If you'd be doing any upgrades, what would you do? I've never upgraded a laptop after I've received it and am not quite sure what would be reasonably easy and affordable.

Could I just buy a faster processor and swap it out? Guess adding some memory would be nice but I assume it's got 2x2GB and to get to 8 I'd have to replace both sticks with 2 x 4GB and I'm not sure if I really need it.

Also, it came with XP and the Vista upgrade, both the 32bit versions. I wouldn't mind getting the 64Bit Vista version. Would Dell be willing to replace the 32bit Vista version with the 64bit?

Of course Windows 7 and Vista would be nice too.

Would be great to hear what you guys think.

post #2 of 7
I would not upgrade CPU or RAM. 4GB's is enough for most. CPU's are expensive. I would buy a larger HDD 320GB or 500GB @7200. Cost is reasonable.

There was a way to upgrade to 64 thru M$ for like $10 in the past look into it. If you want W7 then sure get it in 64bit.
post #3 of 7
The M6400 takes four DIMMS so adding more memory is cheap - you don't have to buy 4 GB DIMMS which are $$$$.

Upgrading the CPU is easy todo,

If you have the FX2700 GPU it is a decent one, but the FX3700 is going to cost around $ 800.00 - I would stick to the FX2700.
post #4 of 7
Thread Starter 
Guess upgrading the CPU might be a future option once prices for what I can put in have come down a bit.

Would you put in just a standard HDD or the newer solid state drives? Pricewise obviously the standard hard drives are way better and again, prices will surely come down in the future.

Not sure how I'd add the second drive as it seems the drives aren't as easily accesible on this laptop vs the M90 I've had. Bet there's a wee tutorial on the forum already.
post #5 of 7
Changing or adding a second Hd is very easy on these laptops
post #6 of 7
All above comments are correct

4x2 gig ram = 8gig DDR3 - very cost effective option, great for 64 but OS

7200rpm HDD's - I have 2x500gig 7200rpm set for raid 0 - good speed improvement and storage smaller & slower drives are also good but two running raid strip is best option for speed vs cost. (just run backups - one drive goes and so does your data!!!)

FX3700 - absolutely, if the budget can stretch that far have been noticing a few on fleabay & parts people (expensive but at least you know it will work)

LED RGB display - I'm surprised at the difference in colour intensity of this vs the old CCFL 1900x1200 display, again fleabay is cheapest option.

T9900 CPU - best bang for buck IMO - runs at 3.0ghz but with a lower thermal threshold than the QX9100.

Me I've done most of the above except mine had the FX3700 GPU & the Ram and I can't justify the extra CPU speed over the T9600, it all depends on how much you want to spend as to how far you can go. I prefer dual core over the slower quad cores - for me having more cores will not gain much - others who run multi tasking applications which can use all 4 cores will clearly prefer the parallel processing speed over the clock speed.

anyway enjoy your 6400 a step up over the M90 that's for sure!!
post #7 of 7
Thread Starter 
Thanks to philby for the detailed list of improvements.

For now it looks like a bigger HDD will be a good improvement as I've just moved some data over and only have about 50GB left now. Should probably leave everything I don't really need on my external drives but prefer to have it all on here. So that's justification enough to get a bigger drive.

More memory can't harm but I should really look at how much I actually use. I've talked to a friend who uses UX-NX alot and he said that a faster processor did improve the performance for him quite a bit whereas more memory didn't quite have the same impact.

I've sent an email to Dell to see if they can help me in exchanging Vista 32 bit for the 64 bit version and what my chances are to get rid of XP and have Windows 7 instead. Don't have too much as far as that goes but let's see what they'll tell me.

I usually run one application at a time and don't see a need to move away from the dual core processor.

As far as the graphics card goes I'd love the FX3700 but they are still pretty pricey and so I'll stick to what I have for now. For what I need I think it's ok.

Thanks again for all your input guys.
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home