My experience in Laptop modding
- Victor Le
- Apr 8, 2020
- 3 min read
Just yesterday, I got my Amazon delivery for an Intel Optane memory module that I was going to add in my HP Pavilion 15t laptop. Installing it was no problem. However, once I started my laptop, it immediately went ballistic. In this blog post, I am going to tell you about my experience with the installation of my Intel Optane M.2 PCIe module.
To put everything into context, I am going to list out the specs of my laptop down below now
Laptop: HP Pavilion 15-CS series non-convertible laptop with a blue top from Costco
Processor: Intel Core i7-8550U Base clock: 1.8 GHz
Dedicated Graphics: 4 GB Nvidia MX150
RAM: 16 GB SODIMM DDR4-2133
ROM: 1 TB 5400 Toshiba Hard Drive
Software: 64-Bit Windows 10 Home
Other stuff:
ELAN touchpad
Realtek Wifi and Bluetooth Card
41 Wh battery
B&O Dual firing speakers
Added part: 16 GB Intel Optane via M.2 PCIe
Below, I have the 3 sources I used to help me with installing Intel Optane Memory. After seeing all 3 videos, my conclusion was that it was going to be an easy hardware install. And it was a very easy hardware install. However, when I booted my laptop up, it started going into automatic repair mode, which can cause a reasonable amount of worry. After doing drive checks, changing the boot order, and even trying my own recovery drive, I had no luck whatsoever. At this point, I decided to throw in the towel and use the Windows Media Creation Tool to install a new clean copy of Windows without backing up any data. Though I didn't lose too much data, I still lost data. Nonetheless, once I was able to get all of the correct drivers and software via HP Support Assistant and Windows, I attempted to enable the Intel Optane memory module... without backing up any data, mind you. Surprisingly, my laptop accepted the drive as nothing happened. That is what was supposed to happen earlier, and instead, I lost my data and had to get a new copy of Windows. This is where I am utterly confused, yet happy. Nonetheless, installing this drive has made a BIG difference on my laptop. My bootup time has been cut in half and opening my commonly used apps are almost instantaneous. For me personally, losing about 32 GB of data was worth the added speed that a $20 Intel Optane module can add to my slow hard drive.
Here's the data from CrystalDiskMark:
Before adding Intel Optane:
[Read] Sequential 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1):
77.794 MB/s [ 74.2 IOPS] <106493.60 us>
Sequential 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1):
87.251 MB/s [ 83.2 IOPS] < 11987.19 us>
Random 4KiB (Q= 32, T=16):
0.719 MB/s [ 175.5 IOPS] <705454.06 us>
Random 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 0.325 MB/s [ 79.3 IOPS] < 12573.55 us>
[Write] Sequential 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1):
76.745 MB/s [ 73.2 IOPS] <106271.78 us>
Sequential 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1):
59.767 MB/s [ 57.0 IOPS] < 14588.15 us>
Random 4KiB (Q= 32, T=16):
1.134 MB/s [ 276.9 IOPS] <469843.92 us>
Random 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1):
1.270 MB/s [ 310.1 IOPS] < 3187.12 us>
Adding Intel Optane:
[Read] Sequential 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1):
931.462 MB/s [ 888.3 IOPS] < 8988.14 us>
Sequential 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1):
783.743 MB/s [ 747.4 IOPS] < 1336.47 us>
Random 4KiB (Q= 32, T=16):
529.822 MB/s [ 129351.1 IOPS] < 3951.68 us>
Random 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1):
71.641 MB/s [ 17490.5 IOPS] < 56.76 us>
[Write] Sequential 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1):
179.733 MB/s [ 171.4 IOPS] < 46189.46 us>
Sequential 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1):
162.106 MB/s [ 154.6 IOPS] < 6452.77 us>
Random 4KiB (Q= 32, T=16):
183.238 MB/s [ 44735.8 IOPS] < 11412.41 us>
Random 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1):
52.951 MB/s [ 12927.5 IOPS] < 76.90 us>
In layman's terms: Adding in the Intel Optane module made my laptop run faster.
Now, what is the lesson here: BACKUP YOUR DATA!!!
Make a recovery drive, make a system image, heck even copy the actual hard drive if you want. Because I didn't have a spare USB drive handy, I was unable to do a proper backup of my files.
And that's my first experience with hardware modding. Will I do it again? Yeah sure, why not? Just make a backup and have some patience. I'm pretty sure my next mod would be installing an NVMe M.2 SSD, especially after this experience.
I hope you learn from my mistake!
Victor Le
Linus's Techquickie Video on Optane Installation:
Intel's Official video on how to install Optane:
Hook It Up's Video on how to install a SATA SSD (used as a reference to open my laptop up)
DISCLAIMER: I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGES DONE ON YOUR BEHALF. I AM AN AMATEUR AND THIS BLOG IS NOT A TUTORIAL!
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