hp compaq 6715s laptop

When trying to image this laptop it takes an insane amount of time.

hdparm -tT /dev/sda

Timing cached reads: 4800 MB in 2.00 seconds = 2399.12 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 2 MB in 3.09 seconds = 662.34 kB/sec

The buffered disk reads are broken! Something must be wrong with the disk
controller driver or something.
The wierd thing though is that i created a partition (ext2) and mounted
it. Fired up ftp and downloaded a file at 4.3 MB/sec (maybe ftp doesnt
read the disk) Also tried imaging from a DVD and it still verry slow.
Anyone got any idea? I'd like to try and upgrade the zenworks linux
kernel. Anyone know how this can be done?

Heres my lspci output.

00:00.0 Host bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 7910
00:01.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 7912
00:04.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 7914
00:05.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 7915
00:06.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 7916
00:12.0 IDE interface: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4380
00:13.0 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4387
00:13.1 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4388
00:13.2 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4389
00:13.3 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 438a
00:13.4 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 438b
00:13.5 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4386
00:14.0 SMBus: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4385 (rev 14)
00:14.1 IDE interface: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 438c
00:14.2 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4383
00:14.3 ISA bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 438d
00:14.4 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4384
00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron]
HyperTransport Technology Configuration
00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron]
Address Map
00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron]
DRAM Controller
00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron]
Miscellaneous Control
01:05.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 791f
02:04.0 CardBus bridge: Ricoh Co Ltd RL5c476 II (rev b6)
10:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation Unknown device 1713 (rev
02)