Further Optimize My EeePC

Whether you've an EeePC, a regular laptop or desktop computer, this post is useful for you if you've over 1GB memory (i.e. RAM) installed.

With the replacement of the original 512MB RAM with a 2GB RAM module, I believe there are some spare memory capacity in my EeePC and thus I looked around to find a way to make the best use out of it. I ended up installed Gavotte Ramdisk - a free small application with a simple user interface (download Gavotte Ramdisk ) - and created a 768MB RAM disk. With the RAM disk, I was able to tune my EeePC further and free up some hard drive space originally occupied by Windows. You may like to refer to eeePC 小報告(三) - XP 優化篇 to see what I exactly did.

Optimizing the EeePC

Seeing the previous posts and you'll that I'm kind of addicted to the new toy.

Having installed a slim version of Windows XP as well as purchased a high capacity SD card to increase the laptop's storage, I did the followings as well:

(1) researched online to find tweaks and optimization tips;
(2) sent an email to Asus to clarify whether my laptop's warranty will be voided if I remove the yellow sticker on the back of it to upgrade its RAM;
(3) installed Office 2003 + Firefox;
(4) configured Remote Desktop Connection to my office's PC;
(5) configured it so that it plays now.com.hk & MOOV smoothly.

But I was so impatient to wait for Asus' confirmation that I teared off the yellow sticker 2 days after sending the enquiry to them! I bought a 2GB Kingston notebook RAM last night in Wanchai Computer Centre at HKD320 (I was told that RAM price is dropping significantly recently) on my way back from HKCEC to my office in Wu Chung House. Again, couldn't wait any longer and thus "borrowed" a screwdriver from IT and replaced the RAM module right away. It worked "perfectly" immediately but then I noticed that it took quite long time to boot up, thus I checked and found out that the hard drive free storage dropped to an unusual level: 28MB!!! Spent a few minutes but still couldn't figure out the reason. So? I reworked everything from scratch (i.e. from removing the hard drive partition, install Windows again, repeat the 1-5 steps above) ... all problem solved. I believe the new toy is now configured optimally.

Finally spent 3 hours for the rework + watching Commercial Radio Music Award via now.com.hk at the same time. Went to bed at 3:30am last night!!!

By the way, I finally got an email reply from Asus confirming that removing the sticker and upgrading RAM myself won't void the warranty. You may also
read this from Asus US.

Computer Booster

I bought my home PC a few years ago. Even though it's getting old, I still like its design and tiny size very much. Two complaints though: (1) quite slow when starting up Windows ... and also when loading different resource-draining applications; (2) running out of hard disk space.

Before I slept on Thursday night, I dug out the manual of my PC and took out one of the RAM (I had 512MB memory then) from my computer and put that on my bag. On Friday after work, I sought advice from my friend Michael whether or not such old memory (i.e. DDR RAM) is still available ... then I rushed to Wanchai Computer City to look for that ... once I saw that in a shop on the 1/F, I bought a 1GB piece at HKD450. 'cos I had no idea at that time whether the new RAM worked in my PC, I only bought 1GB but actually I thought of buying 2GB to boost my PC's performance. Once I got home, of course the very first thing was to install the new RAM. There're two memory slots in my PC and thus I installed the 1GB next to a 256MB one, making a total of 1.25GB memory. Not bad at all! And the performance now is: SUPER! I think I'm not going to buy another 1GB 'cos enough is enough ...