Remember the days when computers had green text on a black background? You’re lucky if you don’t! Before graphics cards or Graphics Processing Units (GPU), that’s all that a computer could manage to output on a screen.
A graphics card or GPU is a secondary “brain” in a computer, smart phone or tablet, that is dedicated to managing graphical processing for displays. The GPU is also used for some graphics intensive activities like photo or video editing, graphical design, or computer based art.
Integrated Graphics Cards
Most laptops and some desktops these days use GPUs that are integrated into the CPU or motherboard. They are generally slower than add on graphics cards, but are often adequate if all you want to do is web browsing, email and occasional photo editing.
Monitoring a graphics card
Integrated GPUs will, however, typically struggle with modern games or video editing.
In a desktop machine, it is usually quite easy to upgrade the graphics card. Sadly, this is not the case for laptops.
Can’t stand the heat?
GPUs typically have memory dedicated to them, and have many processing cores. They run at extremely high speeds and can get very hot. It’s crucial that they get the required cooling, and sometimes come with their own fans or even water based cooling systems. When they get too hot, they have to slow down or can even burn out. Keeping a computer clear of dust can be essential for the performance of some graphics cards.
Determining if the graphics card is the cause of a computer slow down, involves some monitoring during real world use. It’s not particularly difficult, but very much depends on what you use your computer for.
If you are buying a new computer specifically for gaming or for driving high resolution displays or multiple monitors, it is very important to choose the right graphics card or GPU.
DeGeekIT can help you identify the root of your computer performance problems and help you identify the best solution. If you do need to buy a new computer or component, talk to us first and find out what’s best for your needs. Empower yourself! Spending a bit of time and money with DeGeekIT will help prevent you from wasting money on poor computer purchases! Contact us today!
So we’ve already identified the RAM as being the equivalent of your brain’s short term memory. Well to stick with the analogy, a Hard Disks (HDD) are the long-term memory.
What are hard disks?
An open hard disk showing the platters and heads
A typical hard disk is an extrapolation of designs that date back over 60 years! You can think of it like an old turntable (record player), with a double-sided disk, with needle and arm on either side of the disk. However, there are always multiple disks (platters) and two heads per platter (one for each side). Instead of grooves and a needle, they are magnetic (like an old tape recorder) and as such are susceptible to being wiped by magnetic fields.
They are mechanical devices and while each platter spins, the head very rapidly moves backwards and forwards from place to place on the platter (it doesn’t just sequentially move from the outside towards the inside). That’s why you sometimes here a spinning noise and a rattling noise inside your machine. When parts of the hard disk starts to fail, you’ll sometimes hear clicking noises as the head tries to read a part of the disk which is damaged.
What could possibly go wrong?
Hard disks DO die. They have a limited life span and some last much longer than others. They’re very susceptible to bangs and knocks, extreme temperatures (inside your computer) and the amount they are read from and written to will influence how long they last.
Since hard disk do not last for ever, and I’ll say it again… they DO die, and they store all of your data (photos, music, videos, documents… everything), it is crucial to keep backups. How frequently you back up your data depends on how frequently you write new data to the disk.
They also slow down over time depending on how full they are and how the data that is written to them is arranged. Remember that I said that they do not read data in a sequential spiral like an old vinyl? Well that’s true: they can randomly move the head to any track anywhere on the disk in any order. However, moving the head from the outside of the platter to the inside of the platter to the inside takes a small, but measurable amount of time.
The more the head has to move to open a file or application, the slower it will load. As the disk gets fuller, data on it gets more and more fragmented across the platters of the disk drive. This causes ever increasing slow down and a partial temporary way to mitigate the problem for a while is to defragment the disk (modern operating systems sometimes do this automatically from time to time).
Monitoring hard disks performance
Your computer will dramatically slow down if it is “swapping” a lot (due to insufficient RAM), to a fragmented page file. The page file is an area on the hard disks reserved for RAM offload.
Bring on the Solid State Drives (SSD)!
Inside a solid state drive (SSD)
Thankfully, in recent years, there has been a revolution in long term storage. Mechanical Hard Disks have been superseded by Solid State Drives (SSD). A Solid State Drive is much more akin to the little SD card you might have in your digital camera. It contains no moving parts and even a cheap one is typically at least 10 times as fast as a hard disk drive.
High capacity SSDs are still quite expensive compared to HDDs, so sometimes desktop computers come with both a small SSD and large HDD (or a drive that combines both).
If your HDD is constantly rattling away or running near its maximum transfer rate, you will inevitably have a slow computer. Occasionally you can find the process that is causing the constant activity and shut it down or lower its priority. Sometimes it’s a crucial activity but it is not unusual to have a malicious hidden piece of malware such as a virus rattling away in the background. It’s important to identify the cause before choosing a solution.
Should I replace my Hard Disks?
Replacing a painfully slow HDD with a fast SSD in an ageing computer is often a relatively easy task. In most cases will make a very dramatic (and cost effective) improvement in your computer speed. It will improve both the boot up time of your computer and how it performs while you are using it.
Buying a new computer without an SSD is highly inadvisable these days. Unfortunately, computer stores will still palm off machines to the unknowing shopper. Keep an eye out for SSD or HDD labels and avoid any machine that only has an HDD.
DeGeekIT can help you identify the root of your computer performance problems and help you identify the best solution. If you do need to buy a new computer or component, talk to us first and find out what’s best for your needs. Empower yourself! Spending a bit of time and money with DeGeekIT will help prevent you from wasting money on poor computer purchases! Contact us today!
If the CPU could be thought of as a brain, then the Random Access Memory (or RAM) would be its short term memory. RAM can only hold data as long as it is receiving power. Unplug a machine (or let its battery completely drain in the case of a laptop) and RAM will forget anything currently stored in it.
RAM is very fast memory. While the computer is running, RAM stores the bulk of the operating system and any active applications, processes or services. If the machine has insufficient RAM, it will offload some of the data to the Hard Disk in a process called “swapping”. Since the hard disk is always a lot slower than the RAM, this is a situation that generally you want to avoid.
Can I have too much RAM?
If you’ve got too much RAM, it rarely goes to waste. Modern operating systems use excess RAM for caching data that needs to be read or written to the hard disk. This allows the computer to delay slow transfers to a convenient time.
Like any component in a computer, RAM comes in many different speeds and types. It used to be very expensive, but prices these days are quite reasonable. Generally, the more you have, the better it is for your computer speed. The amount and type that your motherboard can accommodate will limit your options.
Do I need more memory?
Monitoring Memory Usage
When most of your RAM is in use most of the time (except for caching), then you probably need more. Sometimes you can make a significant difference to your machine performance by:
selectively shutting down unnecessary processes
cleaning up what is running on your machine
Computer manufacturers and retailers still sadly sell computers with barely enough RAM to hold the operating system (e.g. Windows). This can mean that when you buy the machine and start it up, the machine is blisteringly fast, but as soon as you open a browser or, even more so, install an office application or game, the machine grinds to a crawl.
DeGeekIT can help you identify the root of your computer performance problems and help you identify the best solution. If you do need to buy a new computer or component, talk to us first and find out what’s best for your needs. Empower yourself! Spending a bit of time and money with DeGeekIT will help prevent you from wasting money on poor computer purchases! Contact us today!
CPU (Central Processing Unit) and Motherboard… The Brain and Central Nervous System.
CPU – The Computer’s Brain
The CPU, chipset and motherboard are the main “brain” of a computer. Many moons ago, choosing one was relatively simple. Intel would roll out a 80286 (286), and the next one would be a 386 and so on. There were a couple of variants (SX and DX, and different clock frequencies 25MHz, 33MHz etc), but choices were limited, and that made it simple. Then came the Pentium range (branding for the 5 in 80586). If memory serves, my first one ran at 60MHz. Then came the Pentium II (233MHz) and on it went. My last Pentium was the Pentium 4, running at an amazing 3.6GHz (1 Giga Hertz is roughly 1000 Mega Hertz).
It was pretty much the end of the line for “single core” CPUs, but Intel added a feature called Hyper Threading, which allowed the one brain to attempt to multitask to some extent (note to self… I wish I had this feature in my brain).
From this point forward, it got ever more complicated.
Intel and AMD couldn’t keep pushing up the clock speed (frequency) of the machines, because this used more power and generated more heat. As the CPU got hotter, they got less efficient and slower. To combat this problem, they started introducing multi-core CPUs… two or more “brains” on one chip. Initially, these came with slower clock speeds and did very little to speed up a machine, because the software applications simply weren’t written to use multiple CPUs. You tended to find that one core would be overloaded while the other cores sat idle. Going even further, CPUs (that had originally started off as 8 bit, then 16 bit in Windows 3.1 days and 32 bit in Windows 95 days, started to come out in 64 bit varients). It became harder to identify which was the best CPU for you.
Code names, Code names, Code names!
Over the next decade or so, the situation got more and more complex. Each manufacturer made mobile and desktop variants of each generation of processor. Whether it be mobile or desktop variant, there were multiple speeds and number of cores. Each generation started to come with different names to signify their headline performance class (Core i3, i5, i7, and still Pentium and Celeron brands). Beyond that, each generation was complicated by new micro architectures (Sandy Bridge, Ivy Bridge, Skylake and at the time of writing, Kaby Lake is the latest). Within each performance class, for example i7, and each micro-architecture generation, there are different models which can have a huge influence on the speed (eg. 7740X, 7700K, 7700, 7700T). Some come with built in graphics chips, some don’t.
It’s easy to see how even reasonably technical people can be quite easily swindled into buying last year’s CPU, in what looks like a shiny new machine, at your local computer store. It’s also quite easy to buy the wrong variant of this year’s CPU!
So what does this all mean for your own computer’s performance?
Monitoring CPU Usage
Well for one thing, it’s not a bad start to find out exactly what you’ve got in the machine. Fundamentally, if your CPU is running flat out most of the time, your computer is going to be slow. Finding out what is using it can be relatively simple using tools built into the operating system (Windows or Mac OS). Sometimes it is just legitimate processes keeping it busy, but hidden malware could also be using your computer without your knowledge.
Stopping unnecessary processes can do a lot to free up “brain time” and speed up the machine. If it has genuinely got to the stage where the operating system itself or applications you rely upon are frequently taking the CPU to 100% usage, then you may need to invest in a new CPU. This would most likely involve getting a new motherboard, memory (RAM) and possibly a new power supply. In a large desktop machine, this is not always expensive and the replacement process is not too complicated. In a laptop, this usually means investing in a new machine altogether.
DeGeekIT can help you identify the root of your computer performance problems and help you identify the best solution. If you do need to buy a new computer or component, arm yourself with the knowledge of what is best to buy for you by talking to us. Empowering yourself by spending a bit of time and money with DeGeekIT, will help prevent you from wasting money on poor computer purchases! Contact us today!
Computers get slower from the moment we first switch them on and computer stores are more than happy to sell you a new one. But why is your computer slow and is there anything you can do about it?
Why is my computer slow?
Computers slow down over time, right? It’s just one of those facts that we get used to. Here’s the thing… It’s not quite true.
Technically, if you go out and buy a new computer today, don’t unpack it and don’t turn it on, it will be as fast in 10 years’ time as it would have been if you’d unpacked it on the day you bought it. If you do turn it on, but never connect it to the internet, never do anything with it (other than turn it on) and keep it in an airtight box, it is also likely that it will never slow down.
These scenarios, however, are unlikely and impractical in all but the most extreme fringe cases. (A factory that buys an identical backup computer in case a production machine fails, would be one such real example).
In the real world, as a home computer user, we want to use the devices that we have bought. In almost all cases this means using them on the Internet. When connected online, it is essential that we keep them patched and up to date. This introduces the first point of extra drag on the machine.
The reality is that the computer, the physical hardware itself, doesn’t really get any slower, with one notable exception that we’ll come to later (See HEAT and DUST). What makes your computer slow, or act slower, is that you’re unknowingly asking it to do more. It’s like taking a sports car and adding a caravan, a few kids, and a bunch of luggage… It is going to go slower!
So is there anything that we can do about it?
Well yes, to a point. Computer stores all have a vested interest in one solution… getting you to fork out on a new machine, or new parts. That’s how they make money. However, they also have a lot of pressure to shift existing stock and will often unload out of date (read “already slower”) machines and components on the unwitting.
In this article, I’m hoping to expose what makes your computer slow.
To be fully transparent, my vested interest is in selling myself. My business, DeGeekIT, is focused on helping you to help yourself. I sell my time and my advice. I can help you learn how to pinpoint the cause of slow computers (Windows, Mac etc) and other devices (e.g. Smart Phones and Tablets). I hope that I can save you money by showing you how to speed up the technology you already own and pinpoint the bottlenecks if there are any. If it turns out that by replacing one component, rather than replacing the whole machine, you resolve your performance issue, then I’ll point you in the right direction and help you fit it. I will not, however, be selling it to you or be making any profit from selling the hardware.
I’m independent and not affiliated with any brands, so I’ll be as impartial as humanly possible. I will always aim to help you find something that is price appropriate for the hardware you’ve already got. If it turns out that you do actually need a whole new computer, then talk to me first about your needs, and I’ll help you identify the right thing to buy and what to watch out for when the computer salesman is on commission to offload rubbish on you!
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