Improving X40 Performance / Responsiveness

[adrianq]

I'm new here. I've got an X40 with the 1.2 processor 40gig drive and 768meg RAM.

I was suprised by how slow it seems when opening programs and booting. My previous laptop had a 5400rtm 60 gig drive, and my desktop is about 2yrs old now, but it has a 7200rpm drive. It boots in about half the time.

Opening programs like Word and Firefox takes 3-5 seconds, whereas on my other machines it feels almost instant.


I gather the major factor is the slow 4200rpm HD.

I'm wondering if there is anything I can do to improve things a little.

From what I've read on the Forum
1) Removing Norton might help things
2) Reformatting the drive, removing the reinstall parttion (which is a generic image containing lots of stuff that the X40 doesn't need?), and removing any IBM utilities that I don't use might help.

Wondering if people can confirm this before I go ahead and do it?

Also, I haven't found a post that explains to me exactly how to do 2). IBM Australia doesn't supply any CD's. I can order them for $80! (not sure if this is the sam e in the US)
From what I gather
* I can make some disks using rescue and restore or the other utility that comes preloaded (forgot the name, not sure what the difference is)

* Then I delete and reformat the HD - what do I use to get rid of the hidden partition? And am I able to restore it to this state when I sell the machine, or is it gone forever?

* I reinstall windows fresh from ?restore disks or ?a standard WinXP CD.
Then I load the drivers and programs I need off the restore disks?

*Then I reload all my applications and set my settings again

I do have the x4 ultrabase with DVDcombo in it. I assume that after I reformat I can still boot from the ultrabase drive. Or does the ultrabase drive itself require specific drivers before I can use it?

Sorry to ask so many questions, but I would like to make sure the effort is worth it. I also want to know clearly what I'm getting myself in for before I start. I don't want to get half way and then find myself stuck.

[DavidNZ]

Ah - a fellow Thinkpad user in the Pacific! Welcome, mate. How's yer bum fer warts?

IBM Aus is excellent, I've found. They should be able to supply with CDs for free.

My X40 has the exact same peformance patterns as yours. The first thing I did was remove Norton. Completely. I then disable IBM's Message Centre. Everything else is pretty stock - a lot of the pre-installed IBM software can be useful (Access Connections is bloody dream).

Opening Firefox for the first time, yes, takes about 3-5 sec, but after that first time it opens instantly. Same with Word.

I guess I don't mind the slow starts. I was more interested in the form factor over speed. And I think you're quite right about the hard drive: slower means a bit of a bottleneck. I thought I read somewhere that putting in a faster processor without increasing the speed of those little 1.8" drives is pretty much pointless.

Cheers

Dave

[roblim]

You can boot from the cd drive in the base without any special drivers. i just put my x40 in the base and the windows xp cd in the drive. the thinkpad booted from the cd and i proceeded with my windows install.

I just received my refurbished thinkpad x40 1.0 ghz. I let the factory install run once. Took forever to install. once it was installed I was surprised to see so many apps pre-installed with the factory load. my last thinkpad, an x22 had very little pre-installed.

anyways, i deleted the hidden partition--> formated drive --> clean instaledl xp pro and all my apps (office, photoshop, QT, Acrobat, real, dvd player, nero) the x40 is considerably faster after the clean install of windows. now it cold boots in 35 seconds and all apps launch < 1 second. Word should be very fast to launch. in fact it should launch almost instantenously. btw, i have 768 megs of ram which might also help. the drive is slow but i think the biggest slow down is caused by all those apps that come preinstalled. this process of clean installing windows takes me about 6 hours, but in the end it is really worth it. plus i ghost the drive at the end so i never have to go through this again. BTW, slipstream SP2 into XP before you do the clean install. sp2 supports the sd reader and bluetooth natively.

[adrianq]

roblim:
When you say Clean install, you mean from the recovery disks that I make?
Or from a normal WinXP CD.

Also 6hours for a clean install! Is this because you have lots of Apps to install, or does it just take a long time on this machine? I thought just reinstalling windows, office, nero and firefox would take me a couple of hours at most

If from a straight windows CD, how do I get the IBM preinstalled apps back on the machine, or don't you use them at all?

DavidNZ:
how did you get IBM to give you the disks for free. When I spoke to them, they wanted $80 for them!

Thanks for the replies guys. Really appreciate it

[DavidNZ]

I didn't, technically - i just thought they supply them for free because they have in the past. $80 is a bit steep, that's for sure.

[roblim]

I use a non-IBM Windows XP Pro disk. I got it through my school. It is essentially a retail version of XP pro. I stay away from recovery disks because they install all the apps you never wanted in the first place. I think there may be a way to just install windows using files off the hard rive...i think you have to copy the i386 folder onto a cd..but i have never had to make one so i'm not sure. it takes me around 6 hours bec i take my time going through the drivers to decide what is necessary and what is not + lots of personal settings to configure + i ghost the drive several times during the install process.

If from a straight windows CD, how do I get the IBM preinstalled apps back on the machine, or don't you use them at all?

if you want to install some of the ibm apps you can just download them at IBM's X40 driver matrix:

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-54078