6 Posts
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3441
April 9th, 2020 00:00
replace or upgrade ?
I have a Vostro 470 I bought in 2012. I think the HDD is dying. I get frequent freezes, black screens every day and a blue screen every few days. It's okay if I just use it for "light" things, but if I open an audio program like Cubase, it will crash after about 30 minutes. Battlefield V will crash after 15 minutes of BAD performance. I can get a Crucial MX500 SSD SATA 6 Gb/s and a 2.5-3.5 kit for about $160AUD. Although I play games sometimes, my main use is music composing and production and I want to get into film scoring. Could someone confirm whether or not it's most likely the HDD failing. I can't afford a new PC, if I replace it, I'll be getting a second hand PC. What do others think - is it worth changing the HDD for an SSD ?
fireberd
9 Legend
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33.4K Posts
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April 9th, 2020 03:00
I have a recording studio using Cakewalk Sonar and Studio One 4.6 Pro.
It doesn't sound like a hard drive problem. It sounds more like a heat problem, maybe with the CPU cooler.
If you haven't cleaned out the inside of the tower for a while that would be the first thing. Second, monitor the CPU temperature and if that is the issue, considering the age, I would replace the CPU thermal paste with new (Arctic Silver brand recommended).
Give these a go and see how it does.
The Vostro line was sold as an entry level computer business system and not a music production or gaming system. You are trying to make a Volkswagen a Mercedes.
rodavi
6 Posts
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April 9th, 2020 18:00
Thanks for that suggestion, I'll start with the simpler, cheaper solution. The Vostro 470 has - Intel i7 - 3770, 12G DDR3 Ram, AMD Radeon 7570 and a 2T HDD (although it's actually 1.8T). I don't think that it was entry level in 2012, and I didn't pay an entry level price for it. This is why I'm thinking it might be worth upgrading. The Covid19 conditions have decimated my income so fixing/upgrading or buying a used PC are my only choices.
Just asking, the PC is usually pretty slow as soon as it's booted and boot time is slow. Would that be cause by CPU temp? Wouldn't it need to be running for a while for the CPU to get hot?
rodavi
6 Posts
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April 10th, 2020 01:00
By simpler cheaper, I mean thermal paste
fireberd
9 Legend
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33.4K Posts
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April 10th, 2020 03:00
In Dell's business line, they have 3 levels, 1st or "Entry" is the Vostro line, 2nd and main line is OptiPlex and 3rd is the Precision workstation line.
It was well equipped for its time but it was "built to a price". More along the line of a consumer model rather than heavier duty components.
My old recording studio system was an i7 3770 CPU. I had some bottlenecks with recording projects with lots of MIDI files. I upgraded (built a new system) with an i7 6700K and no more bottlenecks.
Unless the hard drive is overheating, other than faster disc access with an SSD you won't gain anything. SSD's run hot to touch (I have them in my new system) and need lots of cooling.
Dell tends to put in minimal CPU coolers and if the CPU is overheating that could be a reason. However, Dell uses proprietary cooling fans and that poses another problem if you replace it with a commercial fan or cooler. Same way with a new standard case, the Dell motherboard is a proprietary unit with non standard mounting holes, proprietary and undocumented front panel connections and the rear motherboard I/O shield is built into the case rather than an insert like standard ATX cases and motherboards. Does not make a case for considering any upgrading.
You can try replacing the CPU heat sink thermal paste as a first step. That is a relatively inexpensive job. Arctic Silver paste is recommended. Arctic Silver also makes a special cleaning solvent kit to properly and safely remove the old thermal paste.
redxps630
9 Legend
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14.6K Posts
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April 10th, 2020 20:00
If you suspect CPU overheating might be the cause of the crashes, you could try download HWMonitor (free) and monitor your cpu temp during video applications.
regarding your initital hdd question, certified and used hdds are quite inexpensive depending on capacity. you can buy a 250GB HDD on line for $5, for example. but before you replace it you could do a clean install of Windows 10 OS and game app to see if there is significant improvement. An OS used for a long time with a lot of temp files not cleaned or other bugs can cause issue.
rodavi
6 Posts
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April 12th, 2020 01:00
Thanks for your suggestion but it looks like the issue has been solved.
rodavi
6 Posts
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April 12th, 2020 01:00
I cleaned the CPU fan and heatsink and applied new thermal paste, cleaned the rear case fan and the GPU fan. It appears to have fixed the issue. I must say I am surprised as the black screens went from once every few weeks 6 months ago, and then got worse and worse and then suddenly, a week ago, happening every few hours, sometimes happening straight after bootup. it matched all the symptoms of a failing HDD according to several experts' websites. I am very grateful for your advice as it was a cheap and easy solution.
Incidentally I saw a used 2014 Optiplex 7020 for sale and thought it may be worth a look after reading your advice but it's specs were far below my Vostro - it had an i5 and only 8G RAM. I got curious and searched ebay for Vostro 470s and found 3 for sale, 2 in the US and 1 in the UK and the specs on all 3 were different. To add to the confusion I looked at the Specs given on cnet.com and they were different again.
In any case, I'm working with the one I've got, thanks for your help. I think now the most sensible upgrade would be the GPU, I found a used Geforce GTX 1050 for $147 which would be much better than the Radeon 7570.
speedstep
9 Legend
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47K Posts
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April 12th, 2020 06:00
Regular hard drive is fine. Hard drives dont have write limits SSD drives do.
https://www.newegg.com/microsoft-windows-10-pro-64-bit-reinstall-recovery-disc-only-no-license-key-included/p/N82E16832350238
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13vY67_sXbg