Archive for the ‘Computer Troubleshooting’ category
Computer Motherboard | My 3 Year Old Daughter Building A Computer
March 14th, 2010Computer Repair Tools
January 8th, 2010A note on computer repair tools:
Standard phillips head screwdrivers (non-magnetic)
Good quality Phillips screwdrivers are the basic requirement. At the very least, you’ll need small and large Phillips screwdrivers of various shaft lengths. A few different sized flat-head screwdrivers are also helpful. Never use magnetic screwdrivers inside computers.
Cordless rechargeable screwdriver
Saves time, effort and are especially useful when fixing multiple PCs.
Paper clips
A unbent paper clip makes for a perfect tool for releasing the drawer of an optical disc drive.
Multitester/voltmeter
Absolute must – most commonly used for testing power supply. It can test voltage, continuity, resistance, and much more. Unlike multitesters, a voltmeter’s only function is to measure voltage.
ATX power supply tester
A simple tool that indicates if your power supply is indeed outputting power, and provides convenient terminals which help you to easily test – voltage using a voltmeter or multitester.
Cable testers
Testers available for most types of cables used within a computer. While there are other ways to test cables, like swapping them with known good cables, cable testers save valuable time.
Port-testing software
Used to determine if various ports are working correctly.
Breakout boxes
Another device used for testing cables & ports. Allows complete flexibility in changing electrical configuration of cables & ports for testing purposes.
Loopback adapters
Available for serial as well as parallel ports, loopback adapters simulate signals that are input into the computer. Works with port-testing software, described earlier.
Anti-static (ESD) wristbands or anklebands
Important tool to protect computer circuits against damage due to electro-static discharge given out by the human body!
Anti-static (ESD) spray
Effectively reduces static electricity on fabric and carpet.
Anti-static (ESD) mats
Provides a static-free surface. Can be along with anti-static wristbands. Includes anti-static floor mats.
POST card (POST – Power ON Self Test)
A simple card that can be plugged to an expansion slot. It contains a small display to a show a problem code, POST cards are time savers & provide accurate & specific diagnoses.
Diagnostic software such as Micro-Scope and PC Certify
There are tons of diagnostic software out there & these products can significantly save time needed to diagnose all kinds of computer problems.
Disk drive installation software
Software utilities provided by the drive manufacturers themselves and from other resources, many of which are available freely. These sometimes come with the drive, but can also be downloaded.
BIOS flashing utilities (by companies such as MR BIOS®)
Use these to flash BIOS and perform other rescue operations on BIOS and also CMOS chips diagnosed with problems.
USB network adapter
Allows easy network access on any computer which has USB ports but no internal network adapter. Used for data transfer & Internet access in networks set up for it.
Data transfer cables
Cables are of various types such as serial, parallel & USB allow for different methods of data transfer. Sometimes, the best solution for a computer diagnosed with serious OS trouble is to format the HDD (which erases all content), and then reinstall the OS & all necessary software. Data transfer is often most efficient method of saving data that will be erased during formatting of the drive. Various software utilities, of which some are supplied with Windows, allow data transfer through these cables.
Cleaning and maintenance tools, vacuums and dust-cleaning sprays
Computers can get dusty inside, dust build-up etc.. interferes with proper cooling. Use sprays such as Blow Off™, while vacuuming to clean and remove dust.
CD/DVD scratch repair kits
These can sometimes save damaged software & data discs.
Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS)
These provide continuous power to a PC when there is a power failure. Indispensable? especially when making changes to a computer’s BIOS, because if power fails during these operations will render a computer useless untill a replacement BIOS chip is strapped in, which isn’t always possible!
Data-recovery software
Software that can recover data from damaged HDDs
Data-recovery companies (such as Ontrack)
When a HDD crashes and the data on the drive is very valuable, these companies, can often recover lost data from your drives for a substantial fee.
Problem-solving software
Software programs like Norton Utilities™ and McAfee® Clinic can solve many different computer related problems & optimize performance.
PC Checkup
January 8th, 2010PC Checkup activities:
1. First, run a scandisk or checkdisk. Let Windows fix any errors.
2. Run a disk cleanup utility…this will flush your temporary internet folder, trash can, temp system files, etc.
3. Delete any garbage files or data…if possible, run a Duplicate File Finder program.
4. Run Defrag on all partitions (NOTE: run this after you have deleted all trash and excess files!)
5. Run a registry cleaner utility and delete or get rid of any orphaned entries in that registry.
6. Check your exisiting swap file for it’s size and location (*will explain location later in the post). If you have a lot of ram (i.e. 1 gig and over) set this swap file to something small, like 250 MB. The reason is that this will force Windows to load more into memory, resulting in faster performance (note: some games and applications actually require a certain sized swap file so check your applications performance after making a size adjustment for any error messages.)
7. Under XP, you can tell Windows to use Classic Style on your desktop, – this will remove the neat single click and internet-style desktop but for lower end systems this will improve performance in other areas, such as gaming and multi-tasking.
8. Run msconfig and under startup and only keep the programs that are essential to load in the tray icon (and hence stay resident in memory). Uncheck anything else non-essential, like an ATI or NVidia control panel, Quicktime utility, Real Audio, etc.
9. Upgrade drivers! Check for the latest BIOS, video, motherboard, sound, etc drivers from the manufacturers. A lot of my friends had chipsets on their motherboard that had advanced disk management capabilities or AGP port settings but the drivers weren’t loaded for them so they were never being used. A simple upgrade realized a noticeable difference. For instance, they didn’t have the latest driver for their AGP port so it was set to 1x, instead of being used at 4x!
10. (OK, so this won’t speed up your PC but it could save you a lot of time and trouble later on!) After making all these improvements, make a working backup! I use Ghost, but for XP users you can also use System Restore…
The following PC Checkup tips are for advanced users. Please do not experiment if you are not sure of the outcome.
1. Take a look under the hood (for IDE owners). How are your IDE devices configured? If you have more than 1 hard drive, put the master hard drive on the primary IDE channel and the secondary hard drive on the secondary IDE channel (most motherboards have two IDE channels).
2. Place all CDROM drives, DVD readers etc. on the secondary IDE channel (or SCSI bus, etc). This will reduce I/O contention with your master hard drive which should have your OS and apps installed…
3. Remember when I mentioned the location of the swap file? OK, if you have 2 hard drives and you have one on the primary IDE channel and the other on the secondary IDE channel, move the swap file to a partition ON THE SECOND hard drive (on the secondary IDE channel). This will greatly improve system performance as the PC can write to the swap file while loading and running OS and system commands without I/O contention on the primary IDE channel!
4. Take a look under the hood (for SCSI owners) What kind of SCSI do you have? If it’s the newer Ultra 160/320 etc cards then guess what? Any devices placed on the same bus will automatically default to the slowest drive on the chain…this means that if you have say, an Ultra 160 SCSI card, and it has an Ultra 160 drive (capable of transferring 160 mb/sec) on the same chain as a SCSI cdrom drive (capable of only 40 mb/sec) then the whole bus slows down to the 40 mb/sec speed…use different chains for the slower devices and maximize those hard drives!
5. Run a utility like WCPUID and check the settings…is your CPU/front speed bus/AGP port running as fast as they should be? If not, check your drivers and BIOS configuration options. Also, are all of your chipset features enabled? If not, then enable them! (usually done in your BIOS!)
6. Dig in to the BIOS…check settings like boot order, for example…is it checking the floppy first? Change this! Select your order to reflect the hard drive first, then CD, then floppy for a noticeable boot time improvement. Also disable any non-used on board peripherals…for instance, – does your motherboard come with an on-board NIC card? Guess what, if you don’t use that NIC card and it is enabled it will eat up valuable CPU cycles and can be detrimental to your systems’ performance. Also, see if you can play with memory timing and CPU clock frequencies (NOTE! This is for expert users only!) Set these timings to “Aggressive” and see what happens in your games and apps…Also, check to see what your video aperature is set to. If you have a video card with 128 megs of on-baord memory, your aperature should be set to this amount too. Read the BIOS owner manual for further non-general performance tricks or improvements! Do you have the latest BIOS firmware version?
7. Under hardware properties, check to see that everything is working properly, and fix any hardware contention issues. You’ll see the dreaded yellow exclamation point (!) beside any hardware componenet that is not working correctly.
8. Evaluate the potential for system/hardware upgrades…usually, the best bang for the buck is adding memory so buy all that you can afford (don’t go much above 512 megs for Win 98 or ME). If you have a motherboard with an 8x – capable AGP port but you are using an older 4x video card, consider upgrading to an 8x card. You get the idea here…
9. Quit using software pigs like Norton system utilities, etc. These place files everywhere and can be a real system resource hog on lower end PCs.
10. Did I mention to make a good backup? Do it now! Also, while you’re at it, run a good virus program with the latest definitions.
There are more options to make your system faster, such as overclocking, etc. but (just about) everything I’ve mentioned in this tech post costs you nothing and will result in faster system performance! Good luck and if you have any questions on how to do anything mentioned here, ask a knowledgeable friend or consult a book, – don’t mess up something trying to do something you are not sure of 
PC Checkup Source : http://faq.programmerworld.net/pc/make-your-pc-faster-guaranteed.html
