10/06/2020
Prolonging the usefulness of your PC/Mac
(Upgrades/Optimisation)
Especially with the current climate, many people may wish to delay that purchase of a brand new, relatively expensive, computer system. However what do you do in the mean time to achieve a comfortable, minimal frustration, computing experience.
Well, there are many options for upgrading your current/aging Desktop Computer or laptop, which can speed up that sluggish machine and provide you with another year or two of usability.
The primary upgrade I would recommend for any system would be to swap out that old spinning Hard Drive (HDD) for a more modern Solid State Drive (SSD). As you computer runs its software off the hard drive upgrading to an SSD that can offer significant performance boost at a very reasonable price.
Hardware upgrade to consider are:
Solid State Drive (SSD) [Both Sata/high speed NVMe]
More and/or Faster Memory (RAM)
More powerful Processor (CPU)
Latest Graphic Card (GPU)
There are also options to consider with your existing hardware.
Dust build up inside of the machine can significantly reduce performance as the system reduces its speed to combat overheating, a general service of the machine can easily fix this issue along with replacing dried out thermal compounds.
The addition of improved cooling hardware can allow your existing system to be tuned/optimised to maximise its performance and run quieter.
Software:
One of the most common reasons for slow computers outside of age, is the introduction of malware, virus and just general digital clutter over time. With some minimal house keeping or getting your PC/Mac serviced these systems can be brought back to life.
Over the last few years the prevalence of many mainstream sleek and well optimised Linux Operating systems has enabled older desktops and laptops to be turned back into fast functional computers for everyday tasks. There are also more and more options becoming avaliable for Gaming on the linux platform i.e Steam supports an ever-growing selection of linux games.
Hope that the information above has given some of you an insight into your options rather than living with that slow machine or just throwing it out the window in frustration.
The Tech Handman
