Category Archives: Building

List of silent fanless laptops

For those of us that appreciate quiet, and the removal of one more point of failure, fanless computers are a wonderful thing. 🙂 While building a fanless desktop computer is quite easy, finding a fanless laptop is quite hard! To make things a bit easier for others interested in fanless laptops, I am compiling a list of laptops that are fanless (or that can be converted to fanless) as well as general resources and links on the topic. [the remainder

Upgrade ASUS N56VM/N56VZ SSD & RAM

If you have a nice ASUS N56VM or N56VZ series laptop you may be wondering how to upgrade it for maximum performance. So here is a photo tutorial on how to upgrade the RAM on these particular ASUS laptops. You can also see get a feel for how to remove the hard drive & upgrade to an SSD as well as seeing the location of the wifi card. NOTE: A number of people have asked what memory and SSD I

Acer Aspire One AO722/AO725 8GB memory upgrade, recommended RAM? [ANSWER]

Q. I am looking at buying either an Acer Aspire One 722 or 725. Do either the AO722 and AO725 support 8GB of RAM? and if so, what is a memory module that is FOR SURE supported?   –Carly A. Hi Carly, here are answers to both your questions: Yes, the AO722 and AO725 support 8GB of memory! Here is a nice Corsair 8GB memory module that is confirmed to work in the AO722/AO725 and right now it is only about $39.50

[HOWTO] upgrading M4400 (RAM, CPU, SSD, BIOS)

NOTE: you can also view all the entries in this Q & A series… I received the following question on my previous post about upgrading a Dell M4400 laptop: Q. Great J.D. Thank you. I also have an M4400. I purchased it a year or so ago so that I could have a portable solution as I explore 3D graphics programs such as 3DSMax etc…Based on your above post (and a few others) I have purchased a qx9300 quad core processor,

Does amount of RAM (size) affect hibernation time? [yes]

Today some laptops, such as the Dell M6500, can have up to 32GB of RAM! (4 sticks of 8GB DDR3) Drawbacks of more RAM However, before you load up your laptop with as much RAM as it can hold, there are some potential drawbacks to more RAM that you may want to consider: #1 Slower hibernation times – if you use the “hibernate” feature of Windows, be aware that the more RAM you have, the longer hibernation will take. Related:

Adding a 3rd hard drive (or SSD + HDD + HDD) and RAID1 on Dell M6500

NOTE: via mSATA it is possible to have FOUR drives in a M6500!!! Complete tutorial to be published soon (with photos). Here are some links in the meantime. More resources:   2nd HDD / SSD Caddy – DELL Precision M6400, M6500, M4600, M6600 [OBHD9-SATA-SATA-B] – $42.00 : NewmodeUS, Hard Drive Caddys for Notebookshttp://www.newmodeus.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=269Notebook Hard Drive Caddys Drive Cloning Drive Adapters Cables Backup Software External Enclosures Desktop Brackets AC Adapters Other Products   Dell M6500 Service Manual – Documentation for removing

Antique secretary laptop desk and cool retro PC mod!

I routinely use my laptop setup in my grandma’s vintage secretary. It is a gorgeous piece of furniture. Every time I sit down at it I think fondly of her. The secretary is very functional with its fold out desktop surface. I would eventually like to build (or have built) a slightly larger version that could accommodate a full PC but keep the old-school antique look. 🙂 Curious about what exactly a secretary desk is?! Secretary desk – Wikipedia, the

Difference between SATA (II) 3Gbs & SATA (III) 6gbps CABLES? [solved]

UPDATE #2: I now have a definitive answer to this question (whether you need new cables for 6GB/s SATA)… see below. UPDATE #1: make sure to checkout the first comment to this post, as John posted some great additional info! Q. Hello, I just got a super fast new Intel 510 SSD drive (and I have a C300 too). I’ve got a bunch of old SATA cables (back when SATA I/II 1.5 gbs 3 gbs was the max) and now