which cpu upgrade is best for me?

okmothman · ‎12-21-2018

Hi all,

I'd like to upgrade my cpu from i5-3320m. I am considering i5-3380m, i7-3540m, or i7-3612qm and would like advice on which would be best for me. Not a heavy gamer, but i do often have several programs in use at once such as web browser, photo viewer/editor, spreadsheet, text editor, etc. I have no real issues at the moment, just wishing to be rid of any possible bottlenecks. Using an ssd hd and 8 (soon to be 16)gb ram. From what I've read it seems i might benefit more from a speed bump in overall ghz more than quad core processing. Your thoughts and advice much appreciated!

erico · ‎12-21-2018

Compatible Intel i7 processors is 3rd Generation Intel Core i7-3520M.

That will help as will the 16GB memory upgrade.

The SATA SSD will be a major performance upgrade.

You won't believe that it is the same notebook.

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okmothman · ‎12-28-2018

Thanks for the help.

Another question if i might... a cpu upgrade will either work, or not work at all, am i correct? I mean, there's no way an incompatible upgrade will kinda sorta work and possibly cause damage? My reasoning is I'd like to try the i7-3540m. If it works, great. If not, i can get the i7-3520m for my HP (as we know that's useable) and i have 2 other laptops where the other can be used. Just need to know I'll do no damage by the effort. The sockets and voltages are the same. Thanks for your advice!

erico · ‎12-29-2018

You're welome!

Trying the Ivy Bridge Intel i7-3540m processor won't cause any damage, but you are likely to see the incompatible processor error message.

The compatible processor information I provided was of a processor known to be compatible with the BIOS.

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okmothman · ‎02-04-2019

Thanks much!

To anyone considering upgrade options, i tried the i7-3540M and it works like a charm with my bios (which was last upgraded in 2017).

In order of upgrade performance i would rank:

1. SSD ( I went with Samsung EVO 512GB) - HUGE speed improvement!

2. CPU Going from i5 to i7-3540M gives me a noticable improvement in running multiple programs at once, and also speed of loading thumbnails of 1,000+ photos.

3. Increasing ram from 8GB to 16GB gave me the least difference in overall speed improvement, yet i still think it helps a bit and i have no regrets as i wanted to remove all possible bottlenecks.

This really is a very different machine than the original! Hope this info is helpful. YMMV, of course.

erico · ‎02-04-2019

The increased memory will help if you use memory intensive programs such as photo editing, music editing utilities, CAD/ CAM programs, just to name a few.

It was a worthwhile upgrade to future proof your notebook for advanced usage scenarios.

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