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General => Technical Help => Topic started by: familydar on Monday 04 December 17 19:44 GMT (UK)
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My Win7 machine seems to be struggling these days. I do ask it to do probably too much multitasking, with multiple databases open, multiple browser windows, word processor, notepad, possibly a spreadsheet or two also. And FTM v6.
Before it gives up the ghost completely I think I need to be looking at replacing it, so I can learn Win10 g-r-a-d-u-a-l-l-y at my own pace while I can still use the old machine for my FH stuff. And find alternatives to any old software that doesn't want to run on a new machine.
I'll be looking at slimline desktops.
Old machine has i3-2100 processor running at 3.10GHz, 4 GB RAM plus another 4 GB in the form of readyboost. 500GB HDD only half full because most of my downloads, images, music etc are on a portable HDD (USB3 but throttled because current PC ports are only USB2). I hope Win10 suports tags, I really don't want to have to recatalogue several thousand photos!
I shall be looking at upgrading the processor and increasing the RAM. RAM sort of makes sense to me but I don't understand processors. Pentium, i3, i5, i7 - and all different numbers and speeds. What makes one better than another?
Advice please in layman's terms - what sort of processor spec should I be looking for in the Jan sales?
Jane :-)
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Different makes of processors have different numbers so not much help if you see a comp. with another type.
Personally I would go for a budget duel-core which is ideal for multi-tasking.
Mines an AMD A10 (quad core)by the way.
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I know less about AMD processors, but hopefully the below description of intel features also apply to AMD processors.
Intel processors are split into three ranges, in increasing performance and price - Core i3, Core i5 and Core i7. They are usually described with a 4 digit suffix, the first digit is the generation number. I think generation 8 has just come out.
In terms of performance, most articles I've read recommend the Intel Core i5 for mainstream users who care about performance, while the Intel Core i7 is made for enthusiasts and high-end users. In general, the higher the 4 digit suffix the better the performance.
Cores, i3 has 2, i5 & i7 have 4. I believe this will effect performance most, each core is effectively its own processor - the more you have the more multi-tasking the computer can do. How well software can utilise multi-core processors does vary, so by itself this may not make a program run faster.
Clock speed, measured in GHz is the number of calculations a processor can manage per a second. However, these days it is a poor indicator of performance.
Turbo Boost is available in i5 & i7, so while running at a lower clock speed (drawing less power) they can boost performance to higher clock speeds when required.
Hyper-threading allows Windows to better multi-task by treating each core as if it was 2 cores (so i3 appears as 4 virtual cores, and i7 appears to have 8 virtual cores). Again, different software utilise hyper-threading by varying amounts.
Cache - more is better, but all i3-i7 are generally okay. Cache is the processors own memory, so it can save time by looking here than moving data to and from the main system RAM.
What's difficult is knowing how all these elements will interact with your system and software, hence the general advise at the start.
If you are looking for a quicker start-up, then consider a Solid State Drive (SSD), though they tend to be more expensive. I also think you are very wise to have the two computers on the go at the same time, especially if you are looking to transfer photos with metadata such as tags. Depending on the software used, this metadata is sometimes kept in a separate file to the photos.
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Like bluesofa above, I'm not overly familiar with AMDs naming convention so I'll stick with Intel.
There's now an i9 range coming onto the market with 10 cores, but they are likely to still be pretty expensive (range starts at over £800 just for the CPU!) and possibly out of your budget.
bluesofa has described it pretty well, but I'd just like to add that in practice it's not always the case that every i7 is going to be faster than every i5 and every i5 is going to give better performance than every i3. There is a bit of overlap between the ranges where certain models of i5 perform better than certain models of i7.
But if you are finding that an i3 is getting slow, go for the best CPU you can afford. That is likely to be one of the latest generations of i5 or maybe even an i7 if you can find one within budget. Sites like cpubenchmark show how each CPU performs under lab tests and are usually enough to give you an indication and help you come to a decision.
You will notice the difference an SSD will make over an HDD. 4GB of RAM is probably enough but it's not expensive to upgrade to 8GB.
I'm not overly familiar with Win10 but there are ways to make it look and feel like Win7/8 if it's too much to get to grips with.
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The simple answer is get the best you can afford, but you really shouldn't need a very high speed processor for the tasks you list. I am still using an old Core2 Duo and speed is not a problem, however I tend not to multi-task to the same level as you seem to. Even so, if you are opening multiple databases and spreadsheets it may be the lack of memory that slows things down, rather than the processor. I upgraded mine to 8GB and noticed a useful improvement in speed. Extra internal memory will be much faster than Readyboost. Similarly a USB2 hard drive will be significantly slower than an internal one. USB3 will be better but still slower than internal. I would always regard the external hard drive as a backup/transfer device and always keep the 'working copy' of my data, images, etc on an internal drive.
I upgraded from Win7 to Win10 with no problems. If you turn off all the unnecessary extra "features" it is very similar to Win7. All my old software worked with 10 but I did have to search hard for a driver for my old scanner.
And, yes, 10 does still support tags
If you open task manager you can see if it is the processor slowing things down. I seldom find the CPU using more than 50% of its capacity, and most of the time it is less than 25%.
Just a final thought: when my old Win7 system got rather slow I discovered it was due to it sneakily downloading files in preparation for the upgrade to 10 ::)
Mike.
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Thank you bluesofa, AngusMcCoatup and Mike, lots of very helpful info, much more than I suspect I could get from a salesperson in a shop.
Having mulled it over, overnight, with the clarity that comes with the wee small hours I realised that it only seems to be certain websites/domains that are generally giving me a problem when using IE11, notably A*y, Ya*oo and to a lesser degree F*search. No probs with Rootschat! I can hear the poor old thing chugging away trying to render a web page and while it's doing this it can't get on with anything else, not even toggle between windows. So I'm going to monitor it for a while and use either firefox or chrome instead, to see if things improve. A bit of a pain as the IE keyboard shortcuts have become second nature to me, and I like the way you can "save as" with downloads, but less radical than starting again with a new machine.
It's still early and all I've done so far is booted the machine and checked a couple of websites I always check first thing. I was going to say it seems much better today but I've just tried to read my Y*o email and all it does is hangs so I think that's fairly diagnostic. Y*o email is fine on a tablet, on a smartphone and using chrome. They are constantly trying to steamroller me into trying their *new* mail and I'm resisting, could be where I'm going wrong ;)
Task manager is showing CPU usage around 25% at the moment (IE11 just this one window, task manager, skype running) and physical memory (is that RAM?) is ~45%. It's running 76 processes and I haven't a clue what some of them are. The biggie is IE11. When I launch chrome it takes a similar amount to IE11. After the initial surge associated with the launch, opening additional ie11 windows increases both CPU and memory even without asking any of those new windows to "do" anything. New tabs don't have the same effect, but I'm a bit set in my ways! If increasing the RAM as Mike did would help it seems like a very cheap fix (although I'll pay someone else to do it for me as I'm not confident with hardware). I also wondered about doing a full backup and system restore as despite regular housekeeping I imagine there is a lot of clutter hanging around, but I'll hold fire on this for the moment.
I appreciate that accessing data on external drives will always be slower than accessing that same data on an internal one, but it works for me. In terms of FH it's only the images that are external, all my look-up databases and FH software are on the internal HDD.
Long live Win7 ;D
Jane :-)
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I think you will succumb to the inevitable & buy a new one. There will always be (increasing) problems with W7 & IE11 without Microsoft support. Your i3 processor should be capable of handling most of what you want to do unless your into web design or gaming.
My view is that increasing the RAM is just throwing good money after bad unless you modernise the software. Easy enough with IE11 but you also need W10.
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Do you use an adblocker with your browser? It might be an idea to give that ago before spending any money on new hardware.
I'm not sure about Chrome but Firefox will grab as much RAM as it wants if there is sufficient available so that's perhaps not a good indication whether you need to buy any more. That was certainly the case with versions up to v56. There's a Quantum (v57) version out now but I don't know to what extent that has been reworked in terms of memory management, maybe none. What I'm trying to say is that if you decide to buy more RAM you might find Firefox just takes more of it cos it's there and free to be used.
If it's just web browsing where you are seeing the most significant slowdown and have decided against a new machine but want to do some upgrading, then I'd double the RAM first of all to see if that improves matters as it should be the cheapest option. And get rid of the readyboost.
Then if that didn't result in noticeable improvements then I'd consider an SSD and clone your existing Windows install onto that. Or even do a clean install of Win7 onto the SSD to clean things up a bit. Then reinstall all your progs and images onto the new drive too.
And as Mike has already indicated, make sure all the content on the external drive isn't your only copy.
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For me the best performance upgrade was when I switched to computers with 2 different disk drives (laptop at home, desktop at work). The system drive C: is (in both cases) an SSD and the boot-up time is amazing in comparison to the old machines.
The installed RAM is also important, as programs keep switching blocks of code and data from core to disk and back again if there is not enough space. I now have 8 GB (previously only 4 GB).
And a general remark: I install all programs on C: (128 GB) and all data on D: ( 1 TB, HDD). If* I make regular backups of D:, then if everything crashes I may need to reinstall software on a new computer or C: disk, but D: may be "unharmed" by the crash, or I can just copy the data from my backup back to D:
Bob
* Did you notice the 'if' ?
That is a topic** all to itself. I try but ...... :-[
** Search RootsChat for backup schemes, programs, etc. :)
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Preaching to the converted Bob. It's why my important data is on portable HDDs (and I even back THEM up!)
Jane :-)
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Jane, I see you are analysing your problem in a scientific manner so you may not need further help but I would certainly encourage you to try other browsers for comparison, and I agree with Angus' first suggestion re an adblocker although we are discouraged from using it on RC ;)
If you are considering a new PC in the next year or so it might not be worth upgrading RAM, etc on your old one, especially if you have to pay someone else to do it. A quick search suggests you might spend in the region of £100 or more for 8GB. I bought my extra RAM secondhand and installed it myself. Much will depend on the age and specification of the old machine of course.
Mike.
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Thanks everyone for their input.
Yesterday I didn't do as much as I sometimes do on the computer and after my "first thing" post here I avoided IE11. It seemed to behave itself.
Going back to the RAM question, yesterday I called in at a local independent computer repair shop. Getting an estimate of what sort of money I could be talking for upgrading RAM was like pulling teeth! Terribly complicated you know, depends on my computer, bring it in for us to look at. No chance, I think the reason it has done so well so far is that teenagers have never been allowed near it! He gestured at some RAM he had for sale, it doesn't look as I imagined at all. About 40 (not possible, I'm only 21) Many years ago I worked somewhere that used EPROMs (erasable programmable read only memory), they used to cling to people's woolly jumpers (shetland was all the rage) like teasels and would be taken home inadvertently. They were also terribly sensitive to static. That's what I though RAM looked like.
Buoyed by Mike's post and the fact that I wouldn't be dealing with tiny components that would need a soldering iron and tweezers to manipulate I decided to look into the DIY approach. From an online retailer which brands itself the UK's No 1 memory supplier it will cost me significantly less than the estimate I was given to double the RAM (Mike was in the right ball park), not least because I can add to what I have rather than replace it as it turns out I have 2 spare slots (to be fair the computer man wouldn't have known this). I'm not confident enough to save even more money by buying second hand, but I am confident I'll be ordering the right product from this particular retailer because they have a comprehensive look-up table which lists the exact same model as my computer. I've watched their video. Compared with flat pack furniture it's a doddle.
So that will be my New Year present to myself if the issue hasn't been resolved by then by other, cheaper means.
Jane :-)
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Jane, I sent you a PM but have just had a further thought about RAM. You need to check which version of Windows you are using as some versions cannot use more than 4GB. Information here:
https://www.online-tech-tips.com/computer-tips/windows-7-ram-requirements-how-much-memory-do-i-need/
I wouldn't want to encourage you to waste your money :-\
Mike.
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Yippee I could push the boat out and go for 16 (I probably won't but I might split the difference at 12 if Santa is kind this year) :D
Jane :-)
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There are two versions of Windows Vista/8/10, depending on what you are using?
32bit or the 64bit version.
32bit can only use up to @3Mb of memory, 64bit can use 16Mb or more.
So any more than 4Mb on a 32bit is a waste, 8Mb is ideal for an intense used 64bit PC.
Brian
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There are two versions of Windows Vista/8/10, depending on what you are using?
32bit or the 64bit version.
32bit can only use up to @3Mb of memory, 64bit can use 16Mb or more.
So any more than 4Mb on a 32bit is a waste, 8Mb is ideal for an intense used 64bit PC.
Brian
Just to be absolutely pedantic, Mb means Megabit which is more likely to be the measured speed of your broadband connection rate.
MB means Megabyte and is a measure of RAM, hard drive storage capacity, etc. I know you likely meant to type GB rather than MB anyway.
But fair point on the memory addressing limitations of 32 bit operating systems, having been with a 64 bit system for three years or so it's something I do tend to forget about.
Jane - There's a utility from the crucial website (maybe that's the one you already used?) which will show you the current RAM configuration and suggest potential upgrades. I don't suggest you buy from their recommendations directly, but it will detail the specification you need. Armed with that info, you can then select the retailer of your choice (or auction site if you want to go down the second-hand route) if you choose to upgrade assuming you do have a 64 bit edition.
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Correction accepted! :D
Brian
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Update - I've increased the RAM
Ordered Boxing Day
Got text around 9:30 yesterday morning telling me it had been despatched
Arrived in today's post
Disconnected computer and took to kitchen where there's good light and room to work
Followed instructions about opening up computer, after discharging any static and earthing myself.
Faced with the unexpected - DVD drive obstructing access to memory slots - YT to the rescue. That's when a second online device is useful.
Gave computer a light hoover (didn't touch anything)
Fitted memory - there's a satisfying click when they go "home" but the process did make my fingers a bit sore temporarily
Put it back together
Plugged in, booted successfully, ran scan tool to confirm it was recognising new RAM
Up and running
Only casualty one broken finger nail.
Jane :-)
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Well done 8)
It's a great feeling when it actually works after you've been tinkering :)
Hope it improves things for you.