Rechargeable Batteries: Which One to Buy, Differences?

Rechargeable batteries come in many shapes sizes and types.  In this article we will cover the surface of the different types of batteries, their common use, when they should be replaced, and what to replace them with.

Batteries are used everyday in any portable electronic device.  So far, there is no other energy source on the the market yet to power our energy hungry equipment.  They are in devices from calculators to  laptops.  We depend on them dearly, however as a consumer know very little about them.  Below is a list of the different common types of batteries that are used in consumer electronics.

•  NiCd:  Nickel Cadmium is found commonly in household batteries such as AA, AAA, 9v, etc.  While this type of battery holds a charge longer, they don’t typically have the voltage that is needed for power hungry electronics such as it’s counterpart NiMh battery.

•  NiMh:  Nickel Medal Hidride is also found in common household batteries as the NiCd batteries, however they have a much higher and needed voltage output for electronics with the trade of a quicker power drainage.  NiMh is the recommended battery of choice for devices such as CD players, mp3 players, wireless devices such as mice, keyboards, etc.

•  Lithium-Ion:  These batteries are used in laptops, cell phones, iPods, iPhones, etc.  These batteries have a long lasting energy drain and don’t discharge as quickly while sitting idle.  Unfortunately, they also don’t come in standard flavors such as the AA & AAA type batteries.  So you will likely see these batteries found in proprietary devices such as listed above.

Common Battery Questions

Do rechargeable batteries ever lose the ability to hold a charge?

Yes, in time, they will hold less of a charge due to the chemicals inside not reacting as they once did when they were new.

My batteries don’t seem to last long in my device is there anything I can do to lengthen the life of the battery?

All rechargeable batteries have a mah rating (Milliampere Hour).  The higher the rating on the battery, the longer it will last.  Be warned however, if your battery charger is only rated to be able to charge up to say a 1800mah, and you buy 2500mah batteries, your charger will either take a much longer time to charge the batteries or not charge them at all.  Be sure to have an adequate battery charger  before or while purchasing new rechargeable batteries.

How long do rechargeable batteries last?

Depends on use, and example would be if you use the batteries in an mp3 player consistently day in and out, charging them once or every other day, then you may get a year or two out of them.  On the other hand, if they are not used as hard, they could have much more longevity.

What should I do with my old batteries?

Recycle them at your local recycling center.  Major retail chains have drop offs that don’t charge to recycle used batteries.  Check you local Yellow Pages for listings in your area.  Some laptop manufacturers in the past have had exchange programs when sending in old laptop batteries for the new one, be sure to check into this as well if you are replacing your laptop battery.  The same applies for cell phones.

Can I mix battery types?

No, always go with the recommended battery type for your device.  Do not deviate from the manufacturer requirements and recommendations.

Can’t I just recharge my normal lithium or alkaline batteries?

Never!  Not only will they not recharge, but you take an extreme risk of fire and explosions.  Just stay away from this thought altogether.

Is fully discharging a battery and recharging bad for a battery?

While the Lithium-Ion batteries are not effected by this, it is recommended for the NiCd and NiMh types.  Fully charging, then discharging will help with there longevity and achieve maximum battery power storage.  However in time they will wear out.

Care for Existing Batteries:

•  New batteries normally come in a discharged or barely charged condition.  Be sure to read the manufacturers recommendation on charging them for the first time.  This is critical to get started off on the right foot with your investment and to get the most life out of them.

•  If you don’t plan to use the battery for more than a month, remove the battery from the device or charger, then place it is a dry, cool, and clean environment for storage.  Rechargeable batteries lose charge when unused.  So, when it is installed back into its device, it may require to be recharged back to capacity.

•  Keep moisture and excessive extreme heat away from batteries.  Heat will cause a battery to explode, potentially causing, bodily harm, burns, fire, or even in some cases death.

•  Dropping and physically damaging batteries is really bad, for it can expose the inner cells and acids to the surface.  Disregard any damaged batteries.

When purchasing new rechargeable batteries, they can be purchased at just about any retail chain.  However, if you are buying a new Lithium-Ion (laptop, iPod, cell phone, etc.) battery, always go with the manufacturer brand for that make and model of device.  Only deviate from the same battery if it is recommended by the manufacturer.  Off brands are fine for as long as they are authentic and guaranteed.

Computer Beep Codes: What do They Mean?

Have you ever noticed that when a computer is turned on there is a single quick beep before you see the screen load?  There is a reason for this other than knowing the computer is on.  It is to let you know that all the functions of the Power On Self Test passed or POST.  In the BIOS of the computer’s motherboard there are many different things that need to be recognized before the computer will will function as a whole such as the CPU, Hard Drive, Video Card, and more.  When a computer sounds off more than one beep or a series of long and short beeps, then that means there is something wrong with the hardware.  Below is a generic general translation of the beep codes.

No Beep:

•  There is likely a short circuit, no power, or possibly loose cards/peripherals.

One Beep:

•  All is well, nothing to worry about.

Two Beeps:

•  There is an error in the BIOS/CMOS.  This will depend on the error message on screen, as to what it is yelling at you for.

One Long Beep and One Short Beep:

•  There is a problem on the motherboard.  This can be related to blown or failing capacitors.

Two Short (Sometimes three Short):

•  Video Card:  If you card is on-board, you may need to replace the motherboard unless there is a slot for a card to be installed.  If you have a video card, try re-seating the card or cleaning out any dust around the slot before re-seating.  Otherwise, it just likely you have a failed/broken video card.

Three Long Beeps:

•  Keyboard Error:  Check for stuck keys, or altogether just replace the keyboard.

Repeated Long Beeps:

•  Memory Error:  Memory has died or is failing.  Replace with new memory.

Continuous H-Lo Beeps (Sounds Like a Siren):

•  Computer Processor Unit is over heating or heated.  Turn system off immediately.  Check thermal compound between CPU and heat-sink, apply new if needed.  Check the fan on the heat-sink to be sure it is spinning.  This can be done after the computer has cooled down for at least 30 minutes.  Briefly turn system on, and see if the fan is running and then turn it back off.

Remember, not all beeps are the same.  They can very from manufacturer to manufacturer.  Checking with your manufacturer’s motherboard manual may be a little more descriptive if the beep error code isn’t listed above.

Computer Loses Track of Time?

It is true, all computers have small internal batteries. These batteries are very much like a watch battery and can be purchased at your local electronics store. Desktop & laptop computers both have a little thing called a BIOS (or also known as Basic Instruction Operating System). This is where your computer understands it has a hard drive,CD-ROM, floppy, and all other electronic parts. It reports to this information to your operating system (Microsoft Windows, Linux, etc.)  From time to time these little guy loose their charge and cause havoc on your computer’s functionality. The system time will not keep, your operating system may not start up are just a couple of items.

In laptops, often the large system battery will not charge properly. These little batteries are not difficult to replace and are often inexpensive to replace. I you are a daring person to fix this on your own, there are a couple of things to remember: first turn off the computer and unplug it for at least 15 minutes, second after opening the case, locate the batter. If the computer is within the last five to eight years it will most likely have a socket it is sitting in. Often it can be popped out with a small flat head screw driver. Do not forget to ground yourself by resting your arm or holding a metal part of the case before you touch any internal components. When you replace the battery, you will need to re-setup the BIOS settings. Most computers ask you at the beginning of booting up to press Del (delete) or F2, etc to enter setup. There are many settings in the BIOS that is user friendly, but there are also advanced settings that may confuse the user. Consult your user manual or call us for assistance.

Tips For Uninstalling Windows PreLoaded Software

New computers, especially the branded ones, often come loaded with several trial software programs. Many Windows computers also come with trial versions of Microsoft products such as the latest Microsoft Office. These preloaded software programs, usually included for promotional reasons, not only clutter your Desktop and Start menu with unwanted shortcuts, but also fill up your hard disk with their files, eat up system resources, and as a result, considerably slow down your computer.

This article lists various methods that you can use to get rid of these unwanted programs and speed up your computer.

The simplest method to remove unwanted programs from computer is to use the Add or Remove Programs utility that is shipped with your Windows computer. To remove programs using this utility, perform the following steps:

1. Open Control Panel, and then select the Add or Remove Programs link.

2. Next, scroll down the Currently installed programs list, and identify the programs you want to remove. For example, to remove AOL from your computer, select the AOL uninstall option from this list.

3. Select one of them, and then click the Remove or Change/Remove button to launch the program uninstall dialog box.

4. Next, follow the screen instructions to proceed with the uninstallation.

5. If prompted, restart you computer and repeat the process until you have removed all the unwanted programs you had identified earlier.

Note: If you want to remove a particular Microsoft update, for example if you want to uninstall Windows Media Player update or Internet Explorer update to resolve some problem, you will have to select the Show Updates check box located at the top of the Add or Remove Programs dialog box. When you select the check box, all hidden Microsoft update entries appear in the Currently installed programs list. After this, you can select and uninstall the updates you do not require.

There are certain Windows components that cannot be uninstalled using the Add or Remove Programs utility. For example, you may not able to remove Windows XP Firewall using this method. In order to uninstall XP firewall, you first need to stop and disable the firewall service from the Services (services.msc) window and then at Start > Run type the following command and press Enter to remove the program.  sc delete Windows Firewall/Internet Connection Sharing (ICS)

Sometimes, it is difficult to completely remove all information related to a program, especially if it is quite large in size. In order to take care of this problem, software manufacturers create program uninstallers. For example, to perform a complete and clean Office 2007 uninstall, you can download and use its uninstaller program available at the Microsoft Website.

There are several third-party tools also available today that you can use to detect any stubborn spyware and adware programs installed on your PC and get rid of all information related to them.

Finally, it is recommended that after you have uninstalled a program, you use a registry cleaner tool to scan and remove any left behind orphan keys. Additionally, it is always a good idea to follow up program uninstalls and the registry cleanup process with a registry defrag, because this task helps in removing any left behind empty registry keys and helps in compressing and thus speeding up the registry and your computer.

Understanding the Basics of the Windows Registry

The Windows Vista registry is a large, complex, and tree–like database built up of keys, subkeys, and their individual values. These keys and values are used to store  onfiguration data linked with user preferences, hardware and software setup, and system settings.

Similar to older Windows operating systems, the Windows Vista registry consists of the following five root keys:

•  HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE (HKLM): Contains configuration information related to all hardware devices and software programs that are installed on your system.

•  HKEY_USERS (HKU): Contains information related to all user profiles configured on the system. HKEY_USERS key has a template, which is used by your system to generate new user profiles with default configuration.

•  HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT (HKCR): Stores information about file types and extensions, protocols, and classes registered on your computer.  This key is user-specific and extracts user-specific data from the HKLM key.  The  information displayed in the HKCR subtree is obtained from the HKLMSOFTWAREClasses and HKCUSOFTWAREClasses keys.

•  HKEY_CURRENT_USER (HKCU): HKEY_CURRENT_USER key contains information related to desktop settings, variables, variables, environment user folders, and other user-specific settings for the current user. Like HKCR, this key extracts user-specific information from the HKU key. The information displayed by this key is pulled out from the HKUSecurity ID key of the user logged in on the system.

•  HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG (HKCC): This key contains information about hardware configuration for the current user. This key extracts relevant information from the HKLMSYSTEM CurrentControlSet CurrentControlSetHardware Profiles key.

Causes of Vista Registry Problems

Registry problems occur due to the accumulation of a large amount of unwanted data within it that cause the registry to inflate to a very large size. The registry of a PC may inflate, if you:

• Install new programs on regular basis

When you install a new program, many entries are added to the system’s registry. Therefore, if you install multiple programs on your system, the data in the registry will also grow, which is likely to inflate the registry.

•  Leave orphan keys on the system

Even when you uninstall large applications from your system, they may leave behind many orphan keys in the registry increasing the number of obsolete and unwanted keys in the Windows registry.

•  Perform registry cleaning

When you perform registry cleaning and uninstall programs, registry holes or empty placeholders of the removed key may be left behind. These keys may keep adding up, slowing down the registry and thus deteriorating the performance of your system.

•  Use Internet, e-mails

Many malicious and corrupt entries are added to the registry by malware programs, such as virus, worms, spyware, Trojans, and adware with regular usage of the Internet or e-mails.

•  System-breakdowns

When a system breakdown occurs, it may corrupt many registry entries. It also damages various faulty applications, DLLs, ActiveX components, device drivers, and other files.

A system’s registry is likely to bloat due to the above-listed factors, and hence may get damaged. This may make your system unstable and cause frequent system crashes.

Registry Tips:  Fixes and Maintenance

Although it is possible to manually fix registry problems by using the “regedit” tool to some extent, it is not easy and foolproof. Therefore, if you are looking for a less tedious and simple registry cleaning procedure, you are recommended to use a reliable registry cleaner tool.

It is possible to perform several registry maintenance tasks by using a registry cleaner tool. The tool enables you to thoroughly scan the entire registry of your system to identify and delete undesired information. There are many benefits of a clean registry. If you scan and repair your registry regularly, you can fix DLL errors, runtime errors, driver errors, and several other computer-related errors. In addition, you can also enhance the performance your computer by maintaining a healthy registry.

You can also defrag your registry by using a registry cleaning tool. A defragged registry offers you quick access and enhances your computing experience. You can also make regular registry backups by using this tool as well as restore the files if your system’s registry crashes.

Computer Recovery Disks: How to Create

These days manufacturers are cutting cost everywhere they can.  One of them is not shipping the recovery discs with the computer that you may have just purchased.  Sadly, most consumers don’t know or realize this until it is too late and the computer has crashed.  In this article we will discuss some of the expectations of a recovery disc, how to create them yourself, and other alternative methods.

If you have purchased recently a new computer and it doesn’t have a set of recovery discs in the packaging, it is already on your hard drive in a special partition.  Normally this partition may me named something to the effect of “restore” or “recovery.”  Now is a really good idea to create a couple of recovery discs to put away somewhere you can find them later should you need them.  If you don’t create these discs, and find yourself with a crashed system, you will be shelling out $15.00 to $40.00 dollars for shipping and handling.  The manufacturers say these discs are “free,” however I find it hard to swallow that mailing a couple of DVD’s are that expensive.  Anyway, onto how to create your own recovery discs.

Every manufactured computer, be it Dell, Gateway, HP, Sony, etc. all have a special partition created on the hard drive of the computer.  This partition contains the recovery data that would restore the computer back to factory defaults as when you first turned it on.  Creating these discs are fairly simple, although you may need more than a few DVD’s to complete the take.  If you have a Windows operating system, and have not uninstalled it, you will find a program to create the restore discs.  Below is a list of the current names of some major manufacturers restore programs to create the recovery discs.

• Dell:  Click on Start, All Programs, then Dell Accessories, and Dell OS Recovery CD.
• HP:  Click on Start, All Programs, PC Help & Tools, and then Recovery Disk Creation.
• Gateway:  Click on Start, All Programs, System Recovery, and then Recovery Media Creator.
• Sony:  On the desktop, press F1 key to bring up Windows Help & Support, Locate Sony Recovery Center Icon and press, then select create recovery discs.
• Windows 8 or newer:  On start screen type:  Recovery, options should appear to right.

Be warned that all the programs above will create recovery discs that do not save any personal data.  These discs will restore a computer back to the factory default as when you first purchased it.  It is recommended to backup all your data to another media, if you have a broadband Internet connection, we recommend backblaze.com for online backup.  It is easy and painless.  If you prefer to use other media such as DVD’s, cd’s, flash drives, then go for it, but please backup your data before proceeding with a restore.  The restore process will wipe out all data currently on the computer.

Alternatively, instead of using the system restore disc creation, you could always just just an authentic operating system disc using your OEM Certificate of Authenticity key on your computer’s chassis.  Doing it this way is starting from scratch, meaning that you will be installing everything manually such as drivers and programs.  This method could take up to 8 hours depending on your technical knowledge.  We would not recommend the average user going this route in restoring a computer, however it is the best route for a clean installation.

How to Prevent Your Computer From Crashing

Computer crashes are a major cause of trouble for many computer users. These crashes not only affect your schedule but may also cause data loss, damage your system and data files, and at times, may even leave your system unbootable. Computer crashes can occur due to several reasons. Commonly they occur when a certain temporary situation arises on a functional computer due to program conflicts or data transmission jams. When this occurs, you may be able to recover easily just by rebooting your system.

However, at times, computer crashes may occur due to user negligence that may result in virus infections, a damaged registry, or hard disk problems. You can easily prevent computer freeze problems due to this, by performing regular PC maintenance. Let us have look at some of the tasks that you can perform to prevent and recover from computer crashes.

Check Your PC for Virus and Spyware Infections

If you notice an abrupt decline in your computer’s performance, it is quite probable that the system is infected by a malware program. Malicious programs, such as viruses and Trojans infiltrate your system and start replicating at a fast space. They also add malicious codes to your applications and corrupt the registry entries. On the other hand, spyware and adware programs add several unwanted programs to your computer that eat up your system resources, steal your personal and confidential information and display pop-ads on the system without your consent.

To combat these infections and to prevent them in the first place, you must configure reliable antivirus and antispyware programs on your system. You must turn on their real-time protection feature to ensure that you are protected against these programs at all times. Additionally, keep these programs updated with the latest signatures and schedule them to run periodic full system scans on your computer.

Maintain your Registry

A damaged and corrupt registry can also cause system freezes and crashes.  Registry problems are usually triggered by digital junk, pertaining to obsolete, invalid, and malicious entries accumulated within the registry. This unnecessary information causes registry bloating, which in turn, causes system errors and freezes. To prevent computer freeze problems, in this case, you must maintain your registry and regularly scan it to repair and remove registry problems. You can do this with help of a registry cleaner tool. Some of the registry maintenance tasks that you can perform using a registry cleaner tool are:

•  Scan and remove registry errors.

•  Repair several computer errors caused due erroneous or corrupt registry entries.

•  Defrag the registry to speed it up and enhance the performance of your Windows system.

•  Back up the registry easily so that if you encounter a problem, you can easily restore the registry from the backup.

Maintain your Hard Disk

To maintain a healthy computer it is also important for you to maintain a healthy hard disk. You can do this easily with the help of Disk Clean Up and Disk Defragmenter tools that come with Windows operating system. Where Disk Cleanup helps in cleaning up the junk files cluttering the hard disk, Disk Defragmenter helps in consolidating the hard disk data and optimizes it for better performance.

If, despite all the maintenance activities listed above, your computer continues to crash, it is quite possible that a recent change in configuration might be causing conflicts on the system. In this case, you can use the Windows  computer crash recovery  tool, System Restore, to revert your system back to its last known error-free working condition.

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Why Do Computers Lockup, Freeze?

Computers are our friends for as long as they work, right?  We all expect them to work when we turn them on, but why do they lockup occasionally or become unstable?  In short, think of a computer a complicated traffic center.  It is directing electrical current all over the place to give you a picture you see on the screen.  When there is a traffic jam, there is a crash (you may know it as the blue screen of death.)   In this article we will discuss some (not all of course) the reasons why a computer freezes or locks up, sometimes causing it to cease from working or functioning normally.

Most Common Reason for Lockups:

•  Bad system software/drivers

•  Spyware/Virus infections

•  Hardware failure or failing

•  Heat

•  Dirty electricity

•  Loose connections

Computers need clean working software and system drivers (software that runs your hardware) to run smoothly.  If a driver is corrupted you could be getting blue screens or automatic restarts.  Like the software, if the computer gets a virus, spyware, or any other kind of infection, then this will bring it to a creeping if not dead halt.  When hardware begins to act up, it will cause all kinds of errors to pop up.  Hard drives, when they begin to fail may delete files without your consent, and/or not allow your system to start.  Power supplies when failing may allow you to use your computer until you play a game or access another device like a DVD drive before the system just turns off or restarts.  Heat is a computer killer.  Be sure all vents and heat sinks are dust free and no clogs.  Most forget that computers are mainly electrical bits of data, if the electricity coming into your computer is “dirty” then so will be the computer.  Power spikes, outages, and bad house wiring will harm a computer in time.  Lastly, loose connections are all too common.  Be sure to check your cables on the back side of your computer as well as on the inside.  If you do this, be sure to do this while your computer is powered off and unplugged from the wall, along with grounding yourself preventing static discharge.

So what do we recommend:

•  Stay up-to date on all patches and updates for your computer from Microsoft and your PC vendor.

•  Keep a periodic backup of your system data easily with BackBlaze Backup.

•  Keep your system software & registry running smooth daily with Registry Booster

•  Never let your computer go unprotected without an Anti-Virus/Firewall.

•  Surge protectors and battery backups keep electrical spikes at bay.

A well built system should last an average of 3 – 5 years depending on environment and maintenance.  If you treat your computer poorly, it will treat you the same right back.  Protect your investment!

Optimizing Computers for Performance: PC Tune Up

While there isn’t anyway to fully cover how to optimize a computer for peak performance, we will attempt to discover the basics that are far too often overlooked.  In this article we will discuss software tweaking and hardware upgrade recommendations.  This article is written with the attempt to be a general guide to address multiple platforms of Microsoft Windows, however the hardware recommendations may be effective for any operating system or PC.  Before doing any maintenance to a computer, be sure there is a working backup of all important files, etc.

Let’s begin with software.  When a computer is not running smoothly, slowing down, and acting sluggish, there are a few things that come mind.

•  Has the hard drive been defragmented lately?

•  Has the hard drive been scanned for errors recently?

•  Are the Start-up files are crammed with junk that really doesn’t need to be loading?

•  Are temporary or unneeded files lurking in the background?

•  Are virus and spyware scanners up-to-date and running?

Defragmentation:

Defragging the hard drive is a very simple process.  Windows has it’s own tool that does this that can be found under the start menu, programs/accessories/system tools menu.  A hard drive after accessing  a file puts it back, however it may not get back to the same place on the platter that which it came.  So in time, data can technically be spread across the drives platter making data retrieval take longer, hence causing fragmentation.  The defrag tool, moves the data back to its home where it belongs.  A hard drive should be defragmented at least once a month or more often depending on how often data is accessed, files installed or uninstalled, or if you use the system as a gaming, video editing, sound editing machine.  In other words it depends on how hard you use the computer as to how often one should defrag the hard drive.

Just as important as defragmentation, is scanning the hard drive for errors.  More often than not, errors that slow down a computer’s performance are file structure and operating system related errors.  Depending on the version of Windows you have will be the difference of the program being called Scan disk or Check Disk.  Both can be found easily if you open the “My Computer” or “Computer” window (Icon on the desktop or in the start menu) and then right click on the hard disk drive (Default is C: however can vary from system to system), click properties.  A dialog box will appear and one of the tabs at the top will say “Tools.”  You want to click that.  You will see here that there are a few choices to pick from.  You already know what Defragmentation is, you want to click on “error checking check now” button.  If you are given the option of checking the options of “Automatically Fix File System Errors & Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors,” be sure to check them.  After pressing start, you may be prompted that the computer needs to start at Windows startup.  You can say ok to this and restart the computer to let it scan, otherwise it will begin.  It is recommend to leave the computer alone while it is scanning.  If you have any programs open, it is recommended to shut them down before beginning the process.

Startup and Temporary Files:

Windows 98 to Windows Vista all have a disk cleanup tool found under in the start menu under programs/accessories/system tools/ and disk cleanup icon.  Press the okay button after it calculates the files to be erased.  Start-up files can be a bit tricky to remove, and we only recommend that you do the following if you consider yourself to more on the advanced side of computing.  You will need a program called “HiJackThis” which can be downloaded over at Trendmicro.com.  This program will show you all the files that start up with your computer.  Be warned however, that if you remove system needed files, you may crash the operating system.  We recommend that you do a system restore point before using this program.  Other safer methods of removing the start up files are by removing them from the start-up menu under the start button menu.

Virus & Spyware:

These little pests are very annoying and will bring any computer to a crawl.  We are not going to say much here because there are so many forms of virus’ and spyware out there that it would be impossible to cover some or all of them.   So we simply will just round up the whole thing with an easy button.  If you would rather automate disk defragmentation, scan disk, temporary file removal, registry cleaning, and all the other PC performance options we recommend downloading Avast .

Avast Premium Security:

•   Anti-virus

•   Anti-spyware

•   E-mail scanning

•   Anti-phishing

•   Rootkit protection

•   Identity protection

•   Website authentication

•   Network monitoring

•   Firewall protection

•   Automatic updates

•   Embedded support

•   Optional anti-spam and parental control

We know this article is long, however, keeping a PC running smoothly isn’t exactly a simple task.  The next section is hardware based.  All the above is the general software applications that can be done.  A computer in time gets old and outdated, however doesn’t mean it needs to be on it’s way out the door.  Here is a list of considerations when thinking about adding performance to your computer and quite possibly get a few more years of use out of it.

•   Memory

•   Hard Drive

•   Video Card

•   CPU

Memory:

Many entry level computers these days don’t come with enough memory.  With applications becoming more and more demanding, it is essential that you have enough.  First find out how much your system can upgrade to and what kind of ram it has.  Consult the computer’s user manual or manufacturer to determine this.  Memory is cheap and very effective in giving a computer the much needed performance.

Hard Drive:

If your computers hard drive is more than 4 years old, you would greatly benefit from purchasing a new one and while your at it, get a larger capacity for file storage.  Hard drives unfortunately do wear out and grow old.  They are mechanical by nature and design, so like a car, they will eventually give up or begin to perform poorly.  With mp3s, ipods, video, and other audio files becoming common, having a larger hard drive will serve well.  Transferring data and your operating system can be done easily with Acronis True Image Home.  With Acronis True Image Home you will be able to move your entire operating system along with all your data from a smaller hard drive to a larger hard drive without the need to reinstall, reconfigure any partitions or operating system.  When purchasing a new hard drive we recommend SATA technology if your computer system is ready for it. As far as what hard drive brand, we recommend Seagate branded hard drives.

Video Card & CPU:

As with the memory, we have seen multiple lower priced PC’s coming without a video card installed.  This is yet another very useful upgrade and will add a lot of performance to your system.  Be sure to verify with the computer’s manufacturer what type of card you can put into the PC and limitations.  Be considerate of the power supply when adding a new video card.  They do draw on amps and wattage, so be sure you have adequate power and amperage.  Upgrading doesn’t have to cost you an arm and a leg, it should be fun and exiting without putting a pain in the wallet.  When upgrading a CPU (central processing unit) be it Intel or AMD based all the above applies the same as the video card as the CPU.  Be sure to check all compatibilities and limitations.  CPU’s are only as good as the memory and video card backing them up.  If you have a great CPU, but a horrible video card and low ram, it will perform poorly because it is carrying their load instead of processing mainly data.

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Article Written By: Mark Raven of Cxtec

August 1, 2008

Ever wish you had the opportunity to get rid of all of your old surplus technology equipment without having to throw it out in a harmful way?  Maybe even get some cash or credit for it?  Well now with a little help from you, CXtec can make it happen.

Cxtec has always been a leading retailer of networking equipment.  They have introduced a program cleverly named equal2new to buy and sell “used” products.  he program’s name makes it clear that these networking products are not simply used and refurbished, but just as good as new.  It is the only certified pre-owned equipment in the entire network marketplace that comes with a complete lifetime warranty.   In order to have such a high confidence level in the  equipment, each piece goes through a rigorous 10-step process before earning the certification seal.

Because CXtec places such an emphasis on testing for quality, buyers can be confident in purchasing the equipment.  Voice over IP, network cables, UPS systems, and switches are all available by the most trusted networking brands including Nortel, Cisco, and HP.  Each piece also has an over 99% out-of-the-box reliability rating so you know you’re getting a trusted product without having to buy brand new.  This will help reduce the cost of a data infrastructure in any company by using equipment longer, at a much more reasonable price.

The equal2new program has many perks, but here are some of the main highlights I picked out.

•  The 10-step certification process-as said before, it solidifies that these products are coming out as good as new and ready to use.

•  Warehouse Conditions-equal2new products are tested and certified in a clean and dust-free environment to help avoid any defects.

•  Large Inventory- there are over $20 million dollars worth of networking equipment ranging from corporate high end needs to basic personal wireless routers.  Thus allowing for fast and seamless shipping.

•  Certified Engineers and Managers- trained experts are brought in to do all of the examining and certification process as well as experienced managers who keep an organized atmosphere.

•  Ready to go to work-When equipment is shipped, it is packaged and ready to go.  No extra hardware is needed.  Just ready to be pulled out of the box and plugged in.

•  The warranty- Who doesn’t love a lifetime warranty?  You know its something you can trust, and if for some reason a problem occurs, just call up and get the situation solved.  Ah peace of mind.

•  Asset recovery- It’s great. Enables you to sell your surplus technology to Cxtec who will then dispose of it in an environmentally safe manner, applying to RCRA and CERCLA regulations.  Get cash, credit, or trade-in-value for your business.

So it’s easy to see why the equal2new program is such a great idea for anyone.  Whether you want to sell your old equipment, or buy these certified products, it makes sense and is a great idea.  This looks like something that could truly take off in the future and not only help many people with their networking needs, but  influence the entire industry.  Visit CXtec Today!