How to make your PC run faster and more efficiently - 1st article in the series

Larry Gonzales of Examiner.com Writes:

One question that I hear on an almost daily basis is, “How do I make my computer run better and faster? Since there are so many different factors that go into making a computer run sluggishly or poorly, I decided to write a series of articles that address the more common problems.

[Quagmire]

Give it a pair of legs and a can of Red Bull.

But seriously, informative article bro!

[GodsHand]

he's quagmire quagmire
you never really know what he's gonna do next
he's quagmire quagmire
giggity giggity giggity giggity
lets have sex!

[sid4gamerfreak]

I own a gaming laptop and a gaming pc but my laptop sucks and when i travel i play on my laptop. U guys know what i do to boost my fps in pc gaming?

My card sucks, its a 8600m gt. But i play every single game out there on high (except crysis) and this is how i do it:

Firstly, I never have too many files. I delete all unnecessary files and thoroughly delete them PERMANENTLY via shredding.

I downloaded a program called game booster which is actually pretty useful. You can make it switch to gaming mode, where it completely eradicates all unnecessary background tasks, almost everything, so memory isnt used. It also has a game defragmentor where if ur game starts up and runs slowly, u can use this tool to make it open faster. So all that memory i have isnt wasted and is used in the game...

Next thing i do is overclocking. I use rivatuner and overclock my graphics card to a reasonable temp without burning my laptop. How do i know the temp of my graphic card? I use cpuid, it tracks the temps of all ur hardware in ur pc and mine runs after overclocking at around 70 degrees. I reckon I could overclock more but i play it safe. Remember overclocking is a risk, u can permanently damage ur pc. Also, overclocking works well with some gpus and not too well with others. Always keep track of ur temp...

Its suprising how my weak graphics card on my laptop can still handle modern games out there.

Update ur drivers constantly. Dont forget. Drivers always improve on the efficiency of the games running and may give a performance boost so always install and update drivers.

Also use Ccleaner to clean files that take up space...

I disable many startup programs as well, this can help and dont clutter ur desktop

[sid4gamerfreak]

@nycredude: Unfortunately i have to do all those settings cause i have a crappy laptop. My gpu is pretty old, so i have to play around with all those settings. On my gaming desktop however, i have a 5870 so i play everything at max 1080p resolution

Ya its celsius

[nycredude]

sid4gamerfreak

I play every game I have on my laptop on maxed settings, and Crysis on everything high at 1080p. And I don't do anything you do. I just bought an Asus G73jh-a1. It also comes with an instant overclock button so i don't have to play around with all those settings.

How the hell do you keep your laptop at 70 degrees? Is it celsius?

[Quagmire]

sorry, double post, please ignore, giggity.

[tdrules]

I find the best way is to reformat every 3 months.
cleans everything out, obviously back up stuff you need.

Belevedere is also useful, I made it so that when i download a picture, it goes into a picture folder etc, so you know where everything is.

CCleaner also helps for cleaning out temporary files that just fill up space.

Finally, overclock if you can!

[callahan09]

Do you do a full-zero reformat? Or just a quick reformat?

[callahan09]

Sorry, double-post.

[branchedout]

Well, in the more advanced computing community, they say reformatting to optimize your computer is a bit silly. And unneeded.

I've found that with use of Revo Uninstaller, you don't need to reformat. You usually do reformats because all of the stuff you install, and uninstall causes the registry to go awry.

Revo Uninstaller says, "LOL NO REGISTRY LEFTOVERS FOR YOOOOOOOOU."

And much like this article states, startup programs can kill your system! I can be on the internet from pressing the power button on my computer within a minute. My need for a SSD doesn't warrent the cost.

[jaosobno]

I've been a PC gamer since 92' (my first PC was now ancient 286) and I can tell you that only way to see any relevant performance boost is by upgrading your components.

While overclocking does give you a little boost (unless you are willing to go extreme with liquid cooling, etc. then it can be a substantial boost), nothing beats more RAM, faster CPU or most important of all a new graphics card.

And that's why PC sucks. It's an endless money hole.

All this "clean your registry" crap will never give you a performance boost.

[callahan09]

Well that's just not true at all. You can buy a PC and on day one have 30 second windows boot time, and launch your browser in less than 1 second. 3 years later, if you didn't take good care of your registry and your machine in general, that 30 second boot time can turn into a 5 minute boot time, and you can be waiting 20 seconds for the browser to launch. Clean your system properly and you can get it back to what it was when it was closer to new.

[Venatus-Deus]

@Callahan

I don’t think he was referring to a computer that hadn’t been looked after and was getting its first maintenance from the user after three years.

[jaosobno]

Windows boot time is not the issue. The framerate is and that one is not archieved by cleaning the registry.

Moreover, when your windows start to boot up slow, it's time for a fresh windows installation. And all those registry cleaners usually end up deleting registry relevant entries and cause you to reinstall windows.

[lonix]

by default any version of windows should be reinstalled every 12 months

[jjesso1993]

not for people that use DD systems like steam who wants be downloading all games every year just keep system clean and dont go stupid websites dont download crap and a pc last years without rebuilding.

[iamgoatman]

You can back up games from Steam quite easily, either by using the in-build back-up feature or simply copying the steamapps folder onto a separate hard drive.

If you use a DD service you should think about backing up your games often anyway, as if theres ever a problem and you have to format your HDD you'll have to re-download everything again which can take ages and use huge amounts of bandwidth.

[jjesso1993]

thanks i was not aware you can do that.

[Kyur4ThePain]

*Bites lip*

[DeepInterludium]

Because Steve Jobs is taking you from behind?

[Nugundam0079]

LOL GOOD ONE-Take THAT you apple Pillow biter!

[Kyur4ThePain]

Good thing is I only had to be a wh0re once. Been smooth sailing since then.

[sam2236]

Stupid article! Everyone knows you just have to download more RAM and delete the system32 folder!

[branchedout]

And you certainly can't forget, the best way to turn off your computer is to yank the power cable right out!

Unless you're on a laptop. Then you just yank the battery out!

[peowpeow]

Woah woah..people might actually try that lol

[Kyur4ThePain]

That's just awesome.

[iamgoatman]

I like to format my PC every 3-6 months if I've done a lot of install/reinstalls in that time. Also If I've updated a lot of drivers, I liked to start again from scratch just in case the unistallation process left anything behind.

I have my 500GB HDD split into 2 partitions, one is around 100GB and holds the OS, whereas my personal files are on the other which is the remaining 400GB or so. That way I can do a format without having to back-up all my files and folders, and once I have reinstalled the OS I just move the target location of the My Documents folder, so games know where to find my game saves etc. I can do a complete format and have my system back to it's current state, minus game installs in roughly an hour, which is hardly anything. I know some people say that a complete format isn't always needed, but if you've done it before It shouldn't take any time at all, and is the more thorough way of cleaning anything that may be slowing you down.

But in the mean time It's always a good idea to keep your registry clean and not fragmented, you can use programs like Ccleaner, but I personally prefer Tune-Up Utilities as it has a lot of other features as well, with the ability to schedule frequent registry cleans amongst other things. Also be sure to degrament your HDD regularly or after installing something large like a game, a fragmented HDD can hinder performance quite badly.

As for this article, I wouldn't recommend disabling services or start-up items if you don't know exactly what you're doing. I know someone who used to end as many processes in task manager as she could, didn't do much good. There are guides around the net that outline what each service does, it's worth a look through if you plan on stopping anything.

[Kyur4ThePain]

No you don't. Wouldn't you rather NOT have to do that?

[XactGamer]

Run a series of maintenance programs every week like spyware, anti virus, reg clean and defrag. Remove start up programs that you don't use and make sure you have efficient cooling.

[Cueil]

Some of you people are crazy! Reinstalling after only 3-6 months... none of those problems even effect how well your system runs games... someone in here nailed it though... things like memturbo and keeping your harddrive as empty as possible are two of the best ways to increase fps

[MetalFreakMike]

I do not need to do that the article says to do. I have 8 gigs of ram, Quadcore Phenom II 955 with a Radeon HD 5870. All of my games run with no problem on high to maximum settings. I also make sure I do not install crap on my computer that I do not need. Just defrag once every week if your on the internet all the time and you will not have any problems. This article is for people with slower computers. I can run Crysis with Firefox and AIM opened at the same time with no problems.

[JJFNIGHTS80]

Man it be nice if I could do that to my crappy Dell 420 XPS I would love to do that. But right now the cooling fan fucked up so I'm stoned till I get a new pc. Hate my damn dell man.