This guide will get lengthy over time. To search for a keyword in the guide, use the CTRL+F command.
NO, YOU CAN NOT USE ANY 8XXX SERIES CARD IN AN E1705/M1710.
GPU OVERCLOCKING: Go here, and carefully follow the instructions for your specific GPU: http://www.notebookforums.com/thread185501.html. All GPU's and systems are NOT created equal, meaning Johny Knucklehead's benchmarks may always be better than yours, even though you both have the same hardware.
IF YOU'VE GOT A BLACK SCREEN OF DEATH (BSOD) DUE TO A BAD GPU BIOS FLASH: http://www.notebookforums.com/thread181387.html. ZZpulp has made an excellent guide for recovering from a bad GPU BIOS flash.
Gaming laptops get HOT. That's one of those prices we pay for having a portable platform capable of playing Bioshock while you sit on your duff at the airport. Before you make a post complaining that your laptop is getting too hot, make sure to get some real numbers with one of these tools. Maybe it's just you.
OVERHEATING:
If your laptop is getting hotter than it used to, there are a few things to try before you lose your mind and start posting new threads with lots of exclamation marks.
- If you changed a component prior to the problem, you should start troubleshooting there.
- If this problem has crept up over time, you more than likely just need to clean the fan and heatsink area of your laptop. Dust, lint, pet hair, and other things are constantly being sucked through that area by your cooling fans. Most clean out their heatsinks every few months, or you can just do it whenever you notice those temps creeping back up.
Using compressed/canned air. I don't recommend this for a couple of reasons.
- This will work to an extent, but you aren't going to get everything out of there.
- The compressed air could possibly spin your cooling fans at a dangerous RPM that may destroy the fan's bearings. If you insist on doing it this way, insert a straightened paper clip into the fan intake to keep it from spinning up.
- Some have also used a vacuum hose to suck debris from the heatsinks without opening the laptop. Again, the only way to get it ALL out is to open 'er up.
ARE YOU TRULY OVERHEATING?
Heat is relative. The keyboard and bottom of your laptop are going to get hot. In order to get rid of these inaccuracies, find a good temperature monitoring program.
- I personally use I8KFanGUI. Lots of user options, and you can control when your fans come on. What is better than that for a gaming laptop? For some reason I8KFanGUI must be adjusted to show proper temperatures. Make sure you go to Options/Advanced and add 8 degrees under Temperature compensation.
http://www.diefer.de/i8kfan/
- The Intel Thermal Analysis Tool (TAT) is an awesome way to beat the piss out of your CPU. This will stress your CPU beyond anything I've ever seen, which comes in handy for T7600G users finding their overclocking limits as well as someone who's undervolting to test for stability.
http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads...ysis_Tool.html
- A great tool for overclocking your GPU, or just seeing how hot it gets, is ATITool. And yes, ATITool does work with Nvidia GPU's, despite it's name.
http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/Tweaking/ATITool/
OPENING THE CASE:
Go to Dell's website to get a guide for disassembling your laptop.
E1705: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/ins9400/en/index.htm.
M1710:http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...0/en/index.htm.
This is the guide I used to first disassemble my laptop. Do it once, and you won't need the guide again. Do yourself a favor and find a screwdriver that FITS. There are roughly 20 screws you must remove. If you strip one of them out, you'll be stuck. When you're in there, you'll see the heat sinks. If you're having heat problems, then you will more than likely see a clump of crap your fans have sucked in there. Just clean it out.
ON LAPTOP COOLERS:
Lots of people post about laptop coolers. USB powered fans don't do much work. Don't spend a bunch of money on a fancy laptop cooler. I personally place my laptop on a large hardback children's book with two plastic bottle caps under the rear. This raises the rear of your laptop to keep the fans from working so hard, plus it lets air circulate underneath as well. If you insist on using external fans, be prepared to make your own rig with external power, as there just isn't anything worth a crap on the market yet.
ON SCREEN 'WOBBLE':
After a while, your screen will probably develop some kind of wobble. Check that the four screws are tight under the hinge cover. There are also two screws (one on each side) of the LCD panel next to the hinge, under small rubber bumpers. Tighten all of them up. If all six screws are already tight, you've done everything you can do. If it's too significant to overlook, get a hold of Dell Spare Parts, or check Ebay.
ON Arctic Silver 5 (AS5):
AS5 is a paste applied to a CPU or GPU core that fills in the small inaccuracies between the core and the heatsink. Before you ask, yes, there is already thermal paste applied to your CPU and GPU. If your laptop is stock, it's more than likely not AS5, but rather Dell's cheap stuff. You can expect a proper application of AS5 to lower your temps about 5C. You can buy it online, or at your local computer/electronics store for about $6.
PROPERLY APPLYING AS5:
You'll need tools to disassemble your laptop, rubbing alcohol and Q-Tips, and a tube of AS5.
Once you're in there, you'll see that four screws hold the heatsink to the GPU. These screws are spring loaded, but properly cured thermal paste may still hold the sink to the core even when the screws are undone. Be gentle when removing the sink. You shouldn't need a prying tool or anything like that.
Once you've got the heatsink removed, you'll see the hardened residue of the old paste. Use your fingernail to carefully remove the residue from both mating surfaces.
Now use the rubbing alcohol and Q-Tips to thoroughly clean both surfaces. ANY foreign material, and even oil from your fingers can hurt heat transfer. Clean clean clean until your Q-Tip no longer shows any residue.
Make sure both surfaces are dry and free of debris. Apply a bead of AS5 to the CPU core. In my experience, it is best NOT to spread it. When you set the heatsink down on the core and tighten it down, the AS5 will spread itself where it needs to go. Gooping too much paste on there may actually make a thermal barrier. Remember, all you are doing is filling the small imperfections where the two surfaces aren't quite flat. You don't need more than a small bead.
Now carefully set the heatsink down on the core, as level as possible. If you have a dual-pipe GPU, you'll need to insert the sink at an angle to get the chipset portion of it in place.
When tightening the sink down, notice the numbers near each screw. This is to ensure the sink is tightened in an "X" pattern. Don't fully tighten each screw, tighten them incrementally, and don't forget to follow your "X" pattern. You should be good to go. BE CAREFUL! This isn't like installing a cylinder head. Just snug the screws. If you strip out the screw hole in the motherboard, you're screwed. I've done it.
You won't see immediate results. AS5 takes time to cure--sometimes as many as 120 operating hours. Several cycles of heat-up and cool-down can accelerate the process. Again, I recommend Intel Thermal Analysis Tool.
AS5'ing the GPU is the same concept, but is slightly different mechanically.
A good rule of thumb is that if you have to remove the heatsink, redo the AS5.
If you don't like my instructions, here is more documentation straight from the Arctic Silver website. www.arcticsilver.com/pdf/appinstruct/<wbr>as5/ins_as5_singlecore_wcap.pdf. You'll have to cut-and-paste this link, sorry.
MAX E1705/M1710 MAX UPGRADES:
NOTE: These various upgrades draw a lot of power. You never want to skimp in this area. I recommend a 130 or 150 watt power supply. Look them up on Ebay under PA-13 or PA-15 respectively. Try to get Dell genuine components when possible, and go with reputable sellers.
NOTE: CPU upgrades DO NOT void your warranty. See here for more: http://www.notebookforums.com/showth...=dell+warranty. I am unsure of GPU upgrades, but would assume the same.
NOTE: If you already have a T7xxx processor, upgrading is not going to yield any kind of worthy performance boost. Put your money into GPU upgrades and RAM.
GPU SIMILARITIES:
FX1500=7900GS
FX2500=7900GTX
FX3500=7950GTX
I don't know why there are identical chips with different names. They are identical accept for their names, and will therefore have the same performance. If you can find one cheaper, get it.
HOW HIGH SHOULD I OVERCLOCK MY GPU? The absolute highest I've ever overclocked and passed a benchmark is 680/840. These are obviously stupidly high clocks and were only to run benchmarks. I run daily at 660/825. The core (first number) will give you better in-game frames per second than trying to get your memory (second number) through the ceiling. The memory clocks show negligible REAL WORLD results above about 730Mhz. The safe zone is 600/800. Your mileage may very.
E1705:
- CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo T7600 @2.33Ghz. NOTE! The E1705 cannot currently make use of the T7600G's overclocking abilities.
- GPU: Nvidia Go 7950GTX 512MB. NOTE! To install the 7950GTX, a small piece of the bottom case must be removed near the heatsink area. This is not difficult, and well worth the extra power. It is not a visible part of the laptop.
- RAM: Up to 4GB PC5400 667Mhz. NOTE! Regardless of 32 or 64bit OS, your info screen will only show 3.25GB of RAM. For this reason most just go with 3GB.
- You can't use 800Mhz RAM.
- RAM cannot currently be overclocked, making it pointless to spend big bucks on high-end RAM.
- You can't overclock it, but you can lower some of the timings. Go here: http://cpu.rightmark.org/download.shtml, and get RMMA 3.72. Haven't seen a whole lot of performance gain from this. Run the RMMA executable, go to to the Memory tab, check the Adjust Memory Timings, and have fun.
M1710:
- Same specs as the E1705, but the M1710 has one advantage. You CAN use the T7600G CPU, which I've seen overclocked as high as 3.16Ghz.
FOR SPARE PARTS, WARRANTY TRANSFER, ETC:
Solapathy has an awesome post where you can find Dell part numbers, service manuals, find out what is covered under your warranty, or find out how to transfer your warranty. http://www.notebookforums.com/thread197478.html
ON BENCHMARKING:
So you emptied your wallet, and now your rig is all ready to go. How do you know how much performance you've gained? Everyone's heard of Futurmark's 3DMark programs. They're nice for bragging rights, but that's about it. I suggest you get a program called FRAPS for benchmarking. It's simple to use, will tell you how many frames per second (FPS) you're pulling real time and in game. You can also initiate a benchmark where FRAPS will tell you your minimum, maximum, and average FPS. This is a far better way to benchmark.
DISK DEFRAGMENTING/DISK CLEANUP: Some people know about these tools, some don't. Either way, you need to be using them. Through normal use, your hard disks become fragmented. This means that things are scattered everywhere about the disks, and the OS takes longer to find what it needs. To find them, navigate to Start/All Programs/Accessories/System Tools. Run the Disk Cleanup first so you're not defragmenting files that may be deleted anyway. Sometimes the defrag can take hours. If you haven't done it in awhile, you may want to start it before going to bed or going to work. You should probably defrag once a week or so, and anytime you install a large game or program.
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN 256MB AND 512MB VIDEO MEMORY?
Video memory comes into play at higher screen resolutions. Say you're playing 'Game X' at 1280x800. The 7900GS (256MB) and the 7950GTX (512MB) will perform similarly. You'd ask yourself why in the hell you spent all of that money on the 7950GTX. Now up the resolution to 1440x900 or 1920x1200 and watch the 7950GTX leave the 7900GS in the dust. When buying a video card, ask yourself WHAT IS MY NATIVE RESOLUTION?, or WHAT RES WILL I BE GAMING AT?
WHAT OPERATING SYSTEM SHOULD I USE?
Windows Vista has a lot of eye candy, and in the process steals performance. Windows XP doesn't have the eye candy, but does have better driver support and will give you a noticeable gain in performance. I gained 700 marks in 3DM'06 just by switching to Windows XP with no other changes. I have no knowledge of any non-Windows Operating Systems.
OPTIMIZING YOUR OS FOR MORE PERFORMANCE:
Right click on My Computer, Properties, Advanced tab, Performance settings. Check 'Adjust for best performance'. Then check the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and 9th boxes from the bottom. You shouldn't be able to tell much of a difference visually, and you'll notice a performance boost. Additionally, if you're still using the OS that was installed by the manufacturer, you still may have a TON of bloatware that is going to rob you of performance. My suggestion would be a fresh install of your chosen OS.
FOR ADVANCED OS TWEAKING: http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/supertweaks.htm. Here they go more into stopping Windows processes for the sake of more performance. There are several columns depending on how 'hard-core' you want to go with your tweaking.
BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH AFTER INSTALLING A NEW VIDEO DRIVER:
ZZpulp has again contributed an awesome guide/fix for the 7950GTX BlueSOD. Go here: http://www.notebookforums.com/thread206010.html.
MY OPINION ON DRIVERS: I have tried a dozen different drivers from stock to Laptopvideo2go to Geforce Tony's Extreme Drivers. All have given me roughly the same performance--and that's if they even worked. In other words, no one driver blew the others out of the water. What am I saying? Find a driver you like, and stick with it. There is no such thing as a 'Super Driver' at this point.
HARD DRIVES:
7200RPM hard drives are faster than 5400RPM hard drives. Sorry. Obvious, yes, but posts continue to pour in asking this question.
RUNNING ON BATTERY POWER:
Gaming laptops draw a LOT of power. They aren't called desktop replacements for nothing. Running on battery power puts you at a disadvantage from the start. The battery only supplies 11 volts whereas the AC adapter gives the full 19 volts. Depending on your settings, you may be lucky enough to get two hours of battery life. If you're going to be gaming or encoding video, do yourself a favor and find an outlet. If you're just typing a school paper, or even watching a movie, there are ways to greatly extend your battery life. Use Nvidia's Powermizer to underclock your GPU to 2D clocks, therefore saving power. This option should be in your Nvidia control panel. Don't worry, you'll still have 3D performance clocks, but only when needed. Another great program for CPU undervolting is Notebook Hardware Control. Has plenty of options for battery saving. Can be found here: http://www.pbus-167.com/chc.htm. If get the error popup when you try to start the program, get the bugfix version.
If you can't find what you need in this post, or your problem is unique, use the SEARCH option. There's a good chance someone else has had that problem in the past. And through a search you'll get the info you need quickly, instead of waiting for someone to see your post and reply to it.
If this guide is inaccurate, needs info added, doesn't credit proper individuals, or has bad links, PM me and I'll do my best to fix the problem.
NO, YOU CAN NOT USE ANY 8XXX SERIES CARD IN AN E1705/M1710.
GPU OVERCLOCKING: Go here, and carefully follow the instructions for your specific GPU: http://www.notebookforums.com/thread185501.html. All GPU's and systems are NOT created equal, meaning Johny Knucklehead's benchmarks may always be better than yours, even though you both have the same hardware.
IF YOU'VE GOT A BLACK SCREEN OF DEATH (BSOD) DUE TO A BAD GPU BIOS FLASH: http://www.notebookforums.com/thread181387.html. ZZpulp has made an excellent guide for recovering from a bad GPU BIOS flash.
Gaming laptops get HOT. That's one of those prices we pay for having a portable platform capable of playing Bioshock while you sit on your duff at the airport. Before you make a post complaining that your laptop is getting too hot, make sure to get some real numbers with one of these tools. Maybe it's just you.
OVERHEATING:
If your laptop is getting hotter than it used to, there are a few things to try before you lose your mind and start posting new threads with lots of exclamation marks.
- If you changed a component prior to the problem, you should start troubleshooting there.
- If this problem has crept up over time, you more than likely just need to clean the fan and heatsink area of your laptop. Dust, lint, pet hair, and other things are constantly being sucked through that area by your cooling fans. Most clean out their heatsinks every few months, or you can just do it whenever you notice those temps creeping back up.
Using compressed/canned air. I don't recommend this for a couple of reasons.
- This will work to an extent, but you aren't going to get everything out of there.
- The compressed air could possibly spin your cooling fans at a dangerous RPM that may destroy the fan's bearings. If you insist on doing it this way, insert a straightened paper clip into the fan intake to keep it from spinning up.
- Some have also used a vacuum hose to suck debris from the heatsinks without opening the laptop. Again, the only way to get it ALL out is to open 'er up.
ARE YOU TRULY OVERHEATING?
Heat is relative. The keyboard and bottom of your laptop are going to get hot. In order to get rid of these inaccuracies, find a good temperature monitoring program.
- I personally use I8KFanGUI. Lots of user options, and you can control when your fans come on. What is better than that for a gaming laptop? For some reason I8KFanGUI must be adjusted to show proper temperatures. Make sure you go to Options/Advanced and add 8 degrees under Temperature compensation.
http://www.diefer.de/i8kfan/
- The Intel Thermal Analysis Tool (TAT) is an awesome way to beat the piss out of your CPU. This will stress your CPU beyond anything I've ever seen, which comes in handy for T7600G users finding their overclocking limits as well as someone who's undervolting to test for stability.
http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads...ysis_Tool.html
- A great tool for overclocking your GPU, or just seeing how hot it gets, is ATITool. And yes, ATITool does work with Nvidia GPU's, despite it's name.
http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/Tweaking/ATITool/
OPENING THE CASE:
Go to Dell's website to get a guide for disassembling your laptop.
E1705: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/ins9400/en/index.htm.
M1710:http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...0/en/index.htm.
This is the guide I used to first disassemble my laptop. Do it once, and you won't need the guide again. Do yourself a favor and find a screwdriver that FITS. There are roughly 20 screws you must remove. If you strip one of them out, you'll be stuck. When you're in there, you'll see the heat sinks. If you're having heat problems, then you will more than likely see a clump of crap your fans have sucked in there. Just clean it out.
ON LAPTOP COOLERS:
Lots of people post about laptop coolers. USB powered fans don't do much work. Don't spend a bunch of money on a fancy laptop cooler. I personally place my laptop on a large hardback children's book with two plastic bottle caps under the rear. This raises the rear of your laptop to keep the fans from working so hard, plus it lets air circulate underneath as well. If you insist on using external fans, be prepared to make your own rig with external power, as there just isn't anything worth a crap on the market yet.
ON SCREEN 'WOBBLE':
After a while, your screen will probably develop some kind of wobble. Check that the four screws are tight under the hinge cover. There are also two screws (one on each side) of the LCD panel next to the hinge, under small rubber bumpers. Tighten all of them up. If all six screws are already tight, you've done everything you can do. If it's too significant to overlook, get a hold of Dell Spare Parts, or check Ebay.
ON Arctic Silver 5 (AS5):
AS5 is a paste applied to a CPU or GPU core that fills in the small inaccuracies between the core and the heatsink. Before you ask, yes, there is already thermal paste applied to your CPU and GPU. If your laptop is stock, it's more than likely not AS5, but rather Dell's cheap stuff. You can expect a proper application of AS5 to lower your temps about 5C. You can buy it online, or at your local computer/electronics store for about $6.
PROPERLY APPLYING AS5:
You'll need tools to disassemble your laptop, rubbing alcohol and Q-Tips, and a tube of AS5.
Once you're in there, you'll see that four screws hold the heatsink to the GPU. These screws are spring loaded, but properly cured thermal paste may still hold the sink to the core even when the screws are undone. Be gentle when removing the sink. You shouldn't need a prying tool or anything like that.
Once you've got the heatsink removed, you'll see the hardened residue of the old paste. Use your fingernail to carefully remove the residue from both mating surfaces.
Now use the rubbing alcohol and Q-Tips to thoroughly clean both surfaces. ANY foreign material, and even oil from your fingers can hurt heat transfer. Clean clean clean until your Q-Tip no longer shows any residue.
Make sure both surfaces are dry and free of debris. Apply a bead of AS5 to the CPU core. In my experience, it is best NOT to spread it. When you set the heatsink down on the core and tighten it down, the AS5 will spread itself where it needs to go. Gooping too much paste on there may actually make a thermal barrier. Remember, all you are doing is filling the small imperfections where the two surfaces aren't quite flat. You don't need more than a small bead.
Now carefully set the heatsink down on the core, as level as possible. If you have a dual-pipe GPU, you'll need to insert the sink at an angle to get the chipset portion of it in place.
When tightening the sink down, notice the numbers near each screw. This is to ensure the sink is tightened in an "X" pattern. Don't fully tighten each screw, tighten them incrementally, and don't forget to follow your "X" pattern. You should be good to go. BE CAREFUL! This isn't like installing a cylinder head. Just snug the screws. If you strip out the screw hole in the motherboard, you're screwed. I've done it.
You won't see immediate results. AS5 takes time to cure--sometimes as many as 120 operating hours. Several cycles of heat-up and cool-down can accelerate the process. Again, I recommend Intel Thermal Analysis Tool.
AS5'ing the GPU is the same concept, but is slightly different mechanically.
A good rule of thumb is that if you have to remove the heatsink, redo the AS5.
If you don't like my instructions, here is more documentation straight from the Arctic Silver website. www.arcticsilver.com/pdf/appinstruct/<wbr>as5/ins_as5_singlecore_wcap.pdf. You'll have to cut-and-paste this link, sorry.
MAX E1705/M1710 MAX UPGRADES:
NOTE: These various upgrades draw a lot of power. You never want to skimp in this area. I recommend a 130 or 150 watt power supply. Look them up on Ebay under PA-13 or PA-15 respectively. Try to get Dell genuine components when possible, and go with reputable sellers.
NOTE: CPU upgrades DO NOT void your warranty. See here for more: http://www.notebookforums.com/showth...=dell+warranty. I am unsure of GPU upgrades, but would assume the same.
NOTE: If you already have a T7xxx processor, upgrading is not going to yield any kind of worthy performance boost. Put your money into GPU upgrades and RAM.
GPU SIMILARITIES:
FX1500=7900GS
FX2500=7900GTX
FX3500=7950GTX
I don't know why there are identical chips with different names. They are identical accept for their names, and will therefore have the same performance. If you can find one cheaper, get it.
HOW HIGH SHOULD I OVERCLOCK MY GPU? The absolute highest I've ever overclocked and passed a benchmark is 680/840. These are obviously stupidly high clocks and were only to run benchmarks. I run daily at 660/825. The core (first number) will give you better in-game frames per second than trying to get your memory (second number) through the ceiling. The memory clocks show negligible REAL WORLD results above about 730Mhz. The safe zone is 600/800. Your mileage may very.
E1705:
- CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo T7600 @2.33Ghz. NOTE! The E1705 cannot currently make use of the T7600G's overclocking abilities.
- GPU: Nvidia Go 7950GTX 512MB. NOTE! To install the 7950GTX, a small piece of the bottom case must be removed near the heatsink area. This is not difficult, and well worth the extra power. It is not a visible part of the laptop.
- RAM: Up to 4GB PC5400 667Mhz. NOTE! Regardless of 32 or 64bit OS, your info screen will only show 3.25GB of RAM. For this reason most just go with 3GB.
- You can't use 800Mhz RAM.
- RAM cannot currently be overclocked, making it pointless to spend big bucks on high-end RAM.
- You can't overclock it, but you can lower some of the timings. Go here: http://cpu.rightmark.org/download.shtml, and get RMMA 3.72. Haven't seen a whole lot of performance gain from this. Run the RMMA executable, go to to the Memory tab, check the Adjust Memory Timings, and have fun.
M1710:
- Same specs as the E1705, but the M1710 has one advantage. You CAN use the T7600G CPU, which I've seen overclocked as high as 3.16Ghz.
FOR SPARE PARTS, WARRANTY TRANSFER, ETC:
Solapathy has an awesome post where you can find Dell part numbers, service manuals, find out what is covered under your warranty, or find out how to transfer your warranty. http://www.notebookforums.com/thread197478.html
ON BENCHMARKING:
So you emptied your wallet, and now your rig is all ready to go. How do you know how much performance you've gained? Everyone's heard of Futurmark's 3DMark programs. They're nice for bragging rights, but that's about it. I suggest you get a program called FRAPS for benchmarking. It's simple to use, will tell you how many frames per second (FPS) you're pulling real time and in game. You can also initiate a benchmark where FRAPS will tell you your minimum, maximum, and average FPS. This is a far better way to benchmark.
DISK DEFRAGMENTING/DISK CLEANUP: Some people know about these tools, some don't. Either way, you need to be using them. Through normal use, your hard disks become fragmented. This means that things are scattered everywhere about the disks, and the OS takes longer to find what it needs. To find them, navigate to Start/All Programs/Accessories/System Tools. Run the Disk Cleanup first so you're not defragmenting files that may be deleted anyway. Sometimes the defrag can take hours. If you haven't done it in awhile, you may want to start it before going to bed or going to work. You should probably defrag once a week or so, and anytime you install a large game or program.
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN 256MB AND 512MB VIDEO MEMORY?
Video memory comes into play at higher screen resolutions. Say you're playing 'Game X' at 1280x800. The 7900GS (256MB) and the 7950GTX (512MB) will perform similarly. You'd ask yourself why in the hell you spent all of that money on the 7950GTX. Now up the resolution to 1440x900 or 1920x1200 and watch the 7950GTX leave the 7900GS in the dust. When buying a video card, ask yourself WHAT IS MY NATIVE RESOLUTION?, or WHAT RES WILL I BE GAMING AT?
WHAT OPERATING SYSTEM SHOULD I USE?
Windows Vista has a lot of eye candy, and in the process steals performance. Windows XP doesn't have the eye candy, but does have better driver support and will give you a noticeable gain in performance. I gained 700 marks in 3DM'06 just by switching to Windows XP with no other changes. I have no knowledge of any non-Windows Operating Systems.
OPTIMIZING YOUR OS FOR MORE PERFORMANCE:
Right click on My Computer, Properties, Advanced tab, Performance settings. Check 'Adjust for best performance'. Then check the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and 9th boxes from the bottom. You shouldn't be able to tell much of a difference visually, and you'll notice a performance boost. Additionally, if you're still using the OS that was installed by the manufacturer, you still may have a TON of bloatware that is going to rob you of performance. My suggestion would be a fresh install of your chosen OS.
FOR ADVANCED OS TWEAKING: http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/supertweaks.htm. Here they go more into stopping Windows processes for the sake of more performance. There are several columns depending on how 'hard-core' you want to go with your tweaking.
BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH AFTER INSTALLING A NEW VIDEO DRIVER:
ZZpulp has again contributed an awesome guide/fix for the 7950GTX BlueSOD. Go here: http://www.notebookforums.com/thread206010.html.
MY OPINION ON DRIVERS: I have tried a dozen different drivers from stock to Laptopvideo2go to Geforce Tony's Extreme Drivers. All have given me roughly the same performance--and that's if they even worked. In other words, no one driver blew the others out of the water. What am I saying? Find a driver you like, and stick with it. There is no such thing as a 'Super Driver' at this point.
HARD DRIVES:
7200RPM hard drives are faster than 5400RPM hard drives. Sorry. Obvious, yes, but posts continue to pour in asking this question.
RUNNING ON BATTERY POWER:
Gaming laptops draw a LOT of power. They aren't called desktop replacements for nothing. Running on battery power puts you at a disadvantage from the start. The battery only supplies 11 volts whereas the AC adapter gives the full 19 volts. Depending on your settings, you may be lucky enough to get two hours of battery life. If you're going to be gaming or encoding video, do yourself a favor and find an outlet. If you're just typing a school paper, or even watching a movie, there are ways to greatly extend your battery life. Use Nvidia's Powermizer to underclock your GPU to 2D clocks, therefore saving power. This option should be in your Nvidia control panel. Don't worry, you'll still have 3D performance clocks, but only when needed. Another great program for CPU undervolting is Notebook Hardware Control. Has plenty of options for battery saving. Can be found here: http://www.pbus-167.com/chc.htm. If get the error popup when you try to start the program, get the bugfix version.
If you can't find what you need in this post, or your problem is unique, use the SEARCH option. There's a good chance someone else has had that problem in the past. And through a search you'll get the info you need quickly, instead of waiting for someone to see your post and reply to it.
If this guide is inaccurate, needs info added, doesn't credit proper individuals, or has bad links, PM me and I'll do my best to fix the problem.
