Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Overclock for Extra Performance

Overclocking is one of the best routes of giving your system a great performance boost for free. But the question is, what exactly is overclocking, and how to overclock your system. Basically your processor runs at a designated frequency, also known as clock rates. Increasing this frequency also increases the number of calculations your processor can perform. Overclocking your CPU therefore speeds up the processes. Therefore, instead of purchasing a 3GHz processor, you can actually have your 2 GHz processor work at the speed of a 3 GHz processor, which helps to save your time and money.

You can overlock the RAM and overlock the GPU in your computer by using a variety of overclocking software available. Many computer users who play a lot of heavy games on their PCs, overclock their CPU to enhance the performance. Overclocking is not recommended if you are just planning to use a simple word processor or use your computer to browse the Internet.

But there are several risks involved with overclocking the CPU. Starting with the fact that your warranty will become null and void. This is because you are making the overclocked chip work at a much higher speed then it has been made to perform, and there is a small risk the chip will break. Also be careful, if the chip gets destroyed due to overclocking, you will end up putting your entire system at risk.

Overclocking is mainly used with the GPU and the Processor. Overclocking for them will only work effectively if power is supplied properly, since a higher power surge can permanently damage the hard ware being overclocked. You need to understand carefully how to overclock your CPU before attempting it. Basically overclocking allows more power to be supplied to the component to ensure higher speed. Also, a heat surge may effect the working capacity of other components present on your motherboard. To resolve this problem, you can utilize cooling agents, or install a powerful fan on your processor to ensure sufficient cooling remains. When you start overclocking the CPU, make sure that you increase the speed slowly. This is to ensure the overclocking process runs effectively.

Graphics card overlocking is a better option if you are a gaming fan. This is because overclocking GPU is better then overclocking the processor since you will achieve better results through this method. The performance enhanced gives much better results as compared to overclocking the processor. This also helps you avoid heat surges which could damage your CPU components.

A great overclock software is PowerStrip which you can download from the Internet. This software will help you enhance the speed of your GPU by overclocking it, and you can do use its  applications to effectively overclock the CPU too. By overclocking CPU, you can perform many more tasks on your PC without replacing or upgrading your processor.

Check out more tips for optimizing your computer at http://www.healthycomputer.info/

General PC Housekeeping/Clearing Free Space

Most computer users complain of their computer performance slowing down, and one of the major reasons behind this problem is that they do not have sufficient hard drive space for Windows to run efficiently. While most people are aware of how to free up disk space, but there are various disk cleanup utilities available with Windows, and you can also try compressing old unused files as a start point. Also, you can utilize Windows disk cleanup to remove all unwanted files from your hard drive which are choking it. Also you can go for Wipe Free Space option, which is popularly known as the Disk Defragmentor with Windows users. You can also remove start up programs which are installed during the installation process of Windows, as they slow down Windows itself. Also you can manually remove programs if you have been downloading a lot of videos and music files from the Internet. These files also occupy a lot of space.

Here are a few tips which might help you recover more space on your hard drive and organize it to ensure the smooth functioning of your Windows and will guide you on how to free up disk space.

Start by deleting all files which you are no longer using. Go through your hard drive and select programs, the presence of which will not really have any effect on the performance of your  Windows or your work. Secondly go to the C:\WindowsTemp folder on your hard drive, and delete all files saved their. Windows usually stores files on this folder temporarily. After this, use Windows Disk Cleanup to remove and delete all temporary Internet files. Most of these files contain copies of internet content that you have browsed through and were automatically saved by Windows to help you view this content quickly the next time you go online. If you want to delete this content, all you have to do is go to the Control Panel, and click on the Internet Options icon, and click on the General Tab where you will find the Browsing History section, click on the delete button present in this section. Your Internet browsing history will be deleted. You can also use Windows Disk Cleanup for this purpose

If there is any program that you do not use any longer, you can remove it very easily. If you are a Windows XP user, go to the Control Panel and click on the Add or Remove Programs icon. You will see a list of programs that have been installed on your computer. Select the programs you rarely or do not use at all, click on the remove buttons, and they will be uninstalled. You can also delete all trial programs through this method too. Also, any files that you manually delete, are shifted to the Recycle Bin. Empty it by clicking on the icon. You can also do this through Windows Disk Cleanup.

Finally, you can wipe free space by using the Defragmentation option on your Windows. The Defragmentor defragments your hard drive, where all non deleted files get fragmented after you have deleted unwanted files. This option also helps to organize your your hard drive and smoothing your computer’s performance.

These are certain routes through which you can cleanup your hard drive for space. The above list also includes several Disk Cleanup Utilities available with Windows. So if you are still worrying on how to cleanup your disk, just go through this process. Its easy and effective!

Check out more tips for optimizing your computer at http://www.healthycomputer.info/

Upgrading and Optimizing Computer Hardware

If you have recently purchased a new PC, you would realize how quickly your version would get outdated, even before you have even really started using it.But if you have purchased a full sized desktop (not an all in one PC or laptop), you really are very lucky. This is because you wouldn’t really need to purchase a new PC every time when you start feeling that your computer is unable to run the latest games and software efficiently, or its performance has slowed down as you put more work pressure on it. The solution here, that is if you purchased a full sized desktop, is upgrading your computer. PC upgrading means that you upgrade the hardware components, rather then purchasing an entirely new computer with new hardware components. Also, you can scrap certain parts, like the tower, which can continued to be used by other users for a long time.

But where can you initiate upgrading your PC from? Firstly, you will need to figure out how you would want to upgrade your CPU, and many slots are available with your existing motherboard. You can start of with a RAM upgrade, which means that you only need to replace the existing sticks on your motherboard with larger ones. This can just be the first step towards full fledged upgrading your PC.

The next problem that many PC users face is the shortage of memory space. Most people in these circumstances prefer to purchase an entirely new external hard drive to upgrade memory space. But there is another much more feasible option and that is to purchase an internal hard drive, which comes at the fraction of a price of what an external hard drive would come for, and all you have to do is connect the two plugs and, there you go, your memory is upgraded.

If you are an avid gamer, and keep yourself up to date with the latest games, then you would also need a graphics card upgrade in order to run the new available games more efficiently. An older graphic cards installed in your CPU may not be able to run the latest games available, and therefore the need arises to install a new one to continue enjoying your gaming experience on your upgraded PC. Replacing graphic cards is very easy, and the only you need to do is push the new card onto the designated socket on your motherboard and you will have your graphic card installed and ready to use.

Most people think upgrading a processor would mean that you would need to change your entire motherboard, and the components connected to it. This is not entirely true. While the processor installed on your motherboard is closely matched with its working capacity, and you would also need to change your motherboard when you upgrade the processor, this does not mean that you will have to replace all the components connected with the motherboard altogether. Your old components, unless out of date, need not to be changed and will fix easily onto your new motherboard.

Get more tips at http://www.healthycomputer.info/

Friday, August 12, 2011

The Importance of System and Software Updates

System and software updates are very important for your computer. You hear that a lot, but no one really explains it to you. Well, you need to keep your computer and software updated from several different reasons. One would be information safety. Because each month hackers find new and exciting ways of stealing your personal information, Microsoft provides system updates as soon as they develop a security feature that keeps your computer safe. After that you have the driver update which makes sure that your hardware components work as fast as possible. This happens because after a hardware component is launched on the market, the manufacturer is able to tweak the drivers ever so slightly to provide better performance and stability. You also have the BIOS update, which is a small chip on your motherboard that actually helps your computer work when there is no operating system installed. This can be important to some users if they want to change a hardware component and it is not compatible with their motherboard, which is several years old. A bios update will certainly help with that and also clears any possible errors that might be caused by it.

To update Windows, you have a very simple and straight forward application that does that for you regularly and you can set it up just the way you want it. When you power your computer on and it finds a new update available, it can simply start downloading and installing it in the background, without even bothering you.

To update the BIOS things are a bit trickier, especially if your motherboard is not one of the modern ones that allow automatic bios updates. In fact, you should leave this to the professionals unless you want to risk damaging your motherboard beyond repair and have to buy a new one.

To update hardware components you have the manufacturer’s website. Check to see what driver version you currently have installed for a certain hardware component and see if the one available for download on the site is newer than yours. Remember that sometimes a new driver does not mean more performance so make sure that you read some opinions about it first. The installation procedure is basically a series of clicks on the next and OK buttons, so it should go right ahead without any problems.

All these updates will maintain your system into top working order and it is a very good idea to check once a month if you need any particular computer updates. If there are, make sure that you install them and remember to check again next month.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Registry Repairing and Cleaning

The registry in your computer is basically simple sheets of information about a certain application and how that application runs and what kind of resources it needs when it is running. Put simply, the registry contains everything your computer needs to know about an application to run it properly and without any errors. However, every now and then something goes wrong and the registry goes berserk and your application stops working. You can identify that this is the problem if the application worked perfectly yesterday and today, when you turned your computer on
it does not want to start anymore. This means that you will need to perform registry repair operations and there are several ways in which you can do this.

The first requires you to know a bit about how the registry is working and what the problem might be. If your application suddenly stopped working it might be because some of the parameters in the registry of that program are no longer valid for your current hardware and software configuration. The best thing you can do is start looking for that error and fixing it. Sometimes it simply is a matter of adding or subtracting a zero
from some command line. This is difficult to find and fix and if you mess it up you might render your computer unusable. So, if you have no experience with this sort of applications, you are better off using one of the other options.

In order to have a clean registry, you can use the built in registry editor and functions that you have in Windows. Now, this is not the most efficient way and might take a while, but it doesn’t cost any money. Make sure that you read the help file before attempting this. It usually works, especially if you have an idea about what the problem might be. If this doesn’t work, but you still don’t want to pay any money for registry cleaners, you can simply save all your work, uninstall the specific application and install back again. If you delete the registry entries that it created, you will have a working application.

If none of this works, you may want to look at a professional set of registry cleaners. These will do the job on their own and you will not need any kind of experience. Just hit the button and wait for a couple of minutes until they solve the issue. Registry errors should not be present anymore and all of your applications should work perfectly and flawlessly.

Check out more tips for optimizing your computer at http://www.healthycomputer.info/