Graphics cards
Since your graphics card is one of the hottest parts of your PC, it also comes with built in hardware monitoring. But unlike the other parts, you can't really control what happens or know exactly what's the temperature. In most cases, the graphics card driver will alert you if the temperature's too hot and slow down the graphics card so it won't get any hotter. When this happens, it's usually a good indication that there's a problem with your graphics card fan or heatsink. Another way to see whether or not there is something wrong with your graphics card is by playing games. If you see artifacts and errors, they might occur if your graphics card is too hot.Heat / Temperature
We now know that monitoring software reports temperature and this is important because we want to keep our components and parts cool. A hot peripheral will have a shorter lifespan than a cool one. If it gets too hot, it might even be permanently damaged. If your processor or ambient temperature gets too hot periodically, this usually means there's something wrong with either your heatsink, fans or airflow inside the case.We briefly touched this subject in the 'Building your PC' article. Most people use active air cooling to keep their processors and graphics card from getting too hot. That means the fan and heatsink must have constant supply of cool air so they may work effectively. Assuming you're using a case, the air inside your case will not be cooler than the air outside. So even if your using 12 inch low speed fans, it really won't help much if you're using a PC in a hot environment. Try using your PC where the air is cool. If your PC don't have any problems when the case is opened, but slowly overheats if it's closed, this usually means there's not enough airflow. The solution: use two fans to help air get in and out of the case and rearrange the cables inside your PC to keep them from hindering the airflow.
One of the most often asked question regarding PC and peripherals temperature is how hot is too hot? This is a difficult question to ask and requires quite a long answer. Any peripherals must have a certain operating condition to work without problems. They usually require room temperature to be around 25 to 30 degrees Celsius. So it's a good idea to try to keep your environment in that temperature. If you can't, then the peripherals will get hotter than normal but it might still be within tolerance. Most peripherals can operate without problems (normal) within 40 to 50 degrees Celsius. They still probably would work above 50 degrees Celsius, but their lifespan will be shorter. Some peripherals with thermal throttling such as processors will slow down and try to stop itself from getting any hotter. So if you're getting slow frame rates, your processors might be slowing down since its not cool enough. Remember that peripherals produce more heat when they're at full load, so when thinking temperature think full load and not idle temperature. How do you know what's the full load temperature of your peripherals? The answer is simple: by monitoring the temperature when you're playing heavy games and applications.
Electricity
Like any other electrical appliance, PC uses electricity, sometimes to a great degree. But the most important thing is that it needs good, clean, stable electricity. We've also touched this subject before: use a UPS with automatic voltage regulator to provide electrify to your PC and peripherals (such as monitor, printers and scanners). Then there is the power supply: remember that your power supply must be able to supply enough power to the other components. Getting a huge power supply with an output of 450 or 600 watts is not the answer. Hard drives, CD / DVD-ROM and some graphics card draws additional power from the 12 volt rail. Motherboards featuring ATX 12 v connectors also provides additional electricity to the processor by using the 12 volt rail, besides using the main 5 volt rail. Add-on cards and memory usually uses the 3.3 volt rail. So check the sustained watt output on each rail of the power supply. Again remember, if your rails went more than 10 % of its supposed values (such as 3,2 or 3,4 volts for the 3.3 volt rail), this is an indication that your power supply is barely keeping up with the electrical demands of your PC.Dust
After a while, dust will accumulate inside your case. Depending on how dirty (dust, cigarette smoke, other airborne agents) the environment is where you use your PC, you have to periodically clean the dust inside your case. Fans and heatsink are the places where dust gather the most. The printed circuit board (PCB) of your graphics card, motherboard and memory will likely be covered in a thin film of dust as well. Just like when building your PC, unplugged all electrical cables and disassemble your PC. Remember to take electrostatic discharge (ESD) precautions and very carefully clean the components and parts. Use a damp cloth for surfaces and a small brush for those hard to reach spots. Let all the parts and components dry for a while, just in case some moisture might still be on any of them. After this, reassemble them just like when you're building your PC.You might also want to use an air filter for the ventilation holes on your PC's case. Just remember that using an air filter does inhibit airflow in some way, so only use them with fans. You could also build your own home-brew filter using old stockings or any cloth that's thin enough, stopping the dust while still letting the air in.
Software
Cleaning Up Windows
Look at your system tray (the ones with icons on the lower left of your screen). Chances are you have more than three icons there, once you have unhid those hidden icons. That's probably too many. Each icons represent a single software running on the background. These programs consume your PC's resources, usually memory which your foreground applications needs most. Look at those icons and see what they are. Most of the time you don't need to run all of them. These are the ones you can do without: QuickTime, Task Scheduler, WinAMP Agent etc. If you're not connected to a network or the Internet, you can close ICQ, Yahoo Messenger, MSN or other instant messaging applications, not to mention any download manager and of course firewall or anti-virus software.
Now, getting them off your PC for now is easy but think: do you really need them to start every time you enter Windows? You could check and configure what programs are ran when you first boot up by running the System Configuration Utility. You could run by choosing 'Run' on the Start Menu and type 'msconfig' (without the quotes). Look for the last tab named 'Startup'. Here you could all those startup programs. Check off the software you don't need.
[Previous Page]
[Go to top]
[Next Page]