hey guys, need a little help here

my sister is a graphic designer & got a laptop roughly 30 months ago now (christmas 2004) and it is a toshiba satellite with the following spec

Centrino @ 1.6ghz with 2mb L2 Cache (
512mb Ram (clock speed unknown)
nVidia GeForce Go5200 (graphics memory unknown)
blah blah

the main problem is the graphics card, and its lack of power really...
when she uses adobe illustrator it will hang for a few seconds every 10 minutes or so, and we all know how annoying it is when using vectors and it hangs and you lose your trail...

anyway, im not too sure of the memory on the video card and i am not 100% sure if it is integrated or dedicated, but im certain its dedicated

shes asked me to take a look at the laptop after this constant hassle, and  i have defragged the registry, removed advanced display features (on XP), removed her antivirus and installed avast (lower resource requirements) and upgraded her apps.

shes just finished university and is looking at whether to upgrade her machine to a mac - far better at handling these types of processes - or upgrading the video card to tie her over until she has a few pay packets under her belt

i have googled online for several video cards...
ATI Radeon X1800 is the one that seems to be the most appropriate (a year old now so hoping it will keep the price down and also powerful enough to do the job)

so basically, any advice on notebook graphics adapters, where to get them installed, if its even possible (i dont know much about notebooks as i dont have one myself) and suggestions on where to buy them from

thanks

feel free to correct me if things have changed, but I dont think you can upgrade notebook graphics chips. Upgrading lappys is pretty much limited to maybe sticking another stick of RAM in and thats about your lot.

There are some laptops that have pci-e graphics slots in them but think they either started on the 5 or 6 series geforce cards. However, most laptops still come with the graphics on the mainboard.

Its almost always integrated into the motherboard and cannot be upgraded. There are a few who have upgradeable graphics but these are few and rare.

Even with named graphics chips there is no guarantee that it will have separate memory. Check in the bios for an option to change memory available to graphics card. Also check that the memory is 512MB in windows.

Check for malware/spyware too.

Personally I would suggest she upgrades to a desktop, it could give her a lot more bang and be cheaper. Kind doesnt matter, if you can find software that does what she wants in Linux use that. She can still use the lappy for mobile computing and use a usb stick to carry her stuff.

Check the latest drivers from the lappys manufacturer are on there too.

cheers guys

i have double checked video card drivers, they are the latest available
the memory reads as 512mb in windows, will try the bios option now

the Go5200 is listed as a dedicated graphics card and not an integrated one on the internet?

Its cheaper to build it as an on board item and saves some little space/weight. You might be lucky and its separate but dont hope too much.

Might be worth checking the graphics window and increasing it. I have seen video stops caused by HD access too, so it may not be the graphics card at all

definitely worth checking if you can get apps she needs in linux. This ubuntu machine Im using is old as the hills but goes like the clappers.

but the illustrator clone on ubuntu is as clunky as a 1930s car.

go for a mac mate. itll be a less of a headache because doing high end stuff in illustrator and photoshop will eat ram for breakfast.

cheers for the replies guys

the RAM was my next  port of call, we had trouble with the graphics adapter sometime last year... giving refresh problems, but I sorted that

she has 512mb, but with a slightly slower processor it could do with being a little bit higher

gonna take a look on the net

Id stick another 512mb ram in for starters mate. Descrete graphics cards for laptops can still be part of the mobo. It just means its not built into the actual chipset of the mobo like some of the intel jobs.

If shes doing a big project then upgrading the ram could help sort out some issues. It would definitely reduce the use of the HD as virtual memory.

a 512MB increase should be enough - and might be relatively cheap.