Asus PC Performance

[vorman]

My laptop is an Asus FX550VX, 16 GB ram, and branded as an entry level gaming laptop.

https://www.evetech.co.za/n/2224/asus-fx550vx-core-i7-gaming-laptop-on-special-with-16gb-ram.aspx

I purchased it not for gaming specifically but rather modelling and CAD applications. TBH, I haven't used it all that much for this purpose either.
But my concern is that processes are rather slow on this PC. Especially start up and restarts. Once switched on, it runs smoothly, though cannot comment wrt intensive gaming and applications.
I just feel my desktop with i7 3770 3.4Ghz CPU performs better than this.
There is no unnecessary crap, bare minimum applications and not much data stored on it either. Also, my start up list is bare minimum and most unnecessary stuff disabled.

Do I need to do some maintenance? I run disk clean up now and then. But what other software you guys would recommend?

 

[Fcon_Vpro]

What harddrive is it running? Just says 1TB.
Is it SSD or standard 5400rpm HDD?
My guess is that is your bottleneck.

Also I found on my dads ASUS notebook that the OS wasn't as bare as I would have preferred.

 

[vorman]

What harddrive is it running? Just says 1TB.
Is it SSD or standard 5400rpm HDD?
My guess is that is your bottleneck.

Also I found on my dads ASUS notebook that the OS wasn't as bare as I would have preferred.

It's a standard HDD.
Did think of upgrading to SSD, but worried about compatibility issues, BSOD and activation errors after. Cannot afford to mess around with my daily driver.

The preloaded ASUS apps are not a lot. Just a software centre thing and 1 other I think.

 

[D4N_CPT]

With Win10 you can safely reload on the new SSD and select the option "Don't have a key" on on the Lic Key Prompt, assuming you have a legal version on the unit currently.

Jut remember to select the correct version (Pro/Home) during the install, or else it will not activate.

Most Drivers are also effortless when installing Win10 from Scratch. You can also keep the existing hard drive as is, until everything is up and running correctly on the SSD, this will allow you to instantly revert to the HDD (by re-installing the HDD into the Machine), if need be...

 

[vorman]

With Win10 you can safely reload on the new SSD and select the option "Don't have a key" on on the Lic Key Prompt, assuming you have a legal version on the unit currently.

Jut remember to select the correct version (Pro/Home) during the install, or else it will not activate.

Most Drivers are also effortless when installing Win10 from Scratch. You can also keep the existing hard drive as is, until everything is up and running correctly on the SSD, this will allow you to instantly revert to the HDD (by re-installing the HDD into the Machine), if need be...

Thank you. The PC came with Windows 10 Home. I used an original Windows 8 Pro key to upgrade to Windows 10 Pro. I just inserted this key in 'Upgrade your edition of Windows' and its been activated since. I understand the auto activate feature, but worried this will not happen since some hardware has changed. Read some issues where people change components and all of a sudden windows cant activate because of a hardware mis-match.

What would you recommend, a clone or complete reinstall on new SSD?

 

[Grouter]

Or just clone HDD > SSD.

 

[D4N_CPT]

Thank you. The PC came with Windows 10 Home. I used an original Windows 8 Pro key to upgrade to Windows 10 Pro. I just inserted this key in 'Upgrade your edition of Windows' and its been activated since. I understand the auto activate feature, but worried this will not happen since some hardware has changed. Read some issues where people change components and all of a sudden windows cant activate because of a hardware mis-match.

What would you recommend, a clone or complete reinstall on new SSD?

Personally, I would attempt a clean install first, if any issues occur you can always wipe the SSD and go the clone route then. Most SSDs ship with free downloadable cloning software.

I had similar concerns when I upgraded my work laptop's SSD, was pleasantly surprised that it activated first go. You can extract the Win10 key beforehand as a precaution, but I have never had the need to use said extracted key.

With my personal laptop I installed a clean copy of Win 7 and completed the activation. Then used my free upgrade, then wiped everything again, followed by a clean Win10 install, which activated without issue. The reason for this unnecessary method, I really wanted a clean install of Windows, not an upgraded install.

 

[WAslayer]

Thank you. The PC came with Windows 10 Home. I used an original Windows 8 Pro key to upgrade to Windows 10 Pro. I just inserted this key in 'Upgrade your edition of Windows' and its been activated since. I understand the auto activate feature, but worried this will not happen since some hardware has changed. Read some issues where people change components and all of a sudden windows cant activate because of a hardware mis-match.

What would you recommend, a clone or complete reinstall on new SSD?

Activation should be tied to motherboard and not hard drive, so you should be fine changing the hard drive to SSD should be fine.. It is also dead easy to contact Microsoft via Live chat and have them activate Windows for you if there are any issues.. I had to do this when I changed my motherboard last year from which I upgraded to Windows 10 from 7..

 

[garyc]

I upgraded a laptop from a mechanical drive to a Samsung SSD using the software that came with the SSD to clone the drive. This worked seamlessly (at least in my case). The original drive was unchanged just in case something went wrong and I needed to swap them around again.

You can probably use that mechanical drive as an additional storage drive on your laptop by replacing your optical drive with it. This will required a caddy to hold it.

 

[vorman]

I upgraded a laptop from a mechanical drive to a Samsung SSD using the software that came with the SSD to clone the drive. This worked seamlessly (at least in my case). The original drive was unchanged just in case something went wrong and I needed to swap them around again.

You can probably use that mechanical drive as an additional storage drive on your laptop by replacing your optical drive with it. This will required a caddy to hold it.

Thank you. I will read up on cloning. Havent done that yet. Hope i dont require an additional PC for the process? How does the ssd connect to pc for cloning?

But yeah, ive got a 1TB HDD currently, a 1Tb SSD is rather expensive.

 

[garyc]

Thank you. I will read up on cloning. Havent done that yet. Hope i dont require an additional PC for the process? How does the ssd connect to pc for cloning?

But yeah, ive got a 1TB HDD currently, a 1Tb SSD is rather expensive.

The SSD connects with the target laptop via a USB cable for the cloning. You will need an external housing or SATA-to-USB cable for the SSD. In my case I went for a smaller SSD than the original mechanical drive due to cost, although this decision will come down to your storage requirements.