System Tuneup Guide

Day 4: Preventing System Freezes:

Many times when your computer freezes up on you, or it seems to hang for long periods of time, you’ll find that there is not much you can do other than reboot…of course you can kiss that report you’ve been working on for hours goodbye!

Many times system freezes are caused by overheating and failures in your RAM. But a corrupted windows registry can also be the culprit. Make sure to test your memory and check your PC fans to ensure they aren’t clogged with dust, the mortal enemy of all PCs!

Your windows registry is the central location where data critical to the smooth operation of your PC is stored. Over time as you add and remove software from your PC, bits and fragments of files, old drivers, etc. can get left behind in your windows registry. This will bloat your registry and start causing corruptions and PC errors over time. You may even find that you are getting long hang times and freezes as discussed above. The easiest way to restore your PC to like new speeds is to make sure you run a top rated registry cleaner on a regular basis. We have found that RegCure worked the best on our test systems, giving us a 15% increase in performance speeds, and eliminating 822 errors!

Download the Free RegCure scan today and get a faster, error-free PC instantly!

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10 Steps to Avoiding PC Disasters: Day 3 - Memory Failure

After the hard drive, your RAM memory is the most likely hardware component to fail, which can cause your PC not to boot or stop responding. You will see most memory errors and problems occur upon installation of your DIMM Memory sticks…but RAM problems can also occur at any time during the daily use of your PC due to power surges or overheating.

If you are getting Stop errors or your PC keeps freezing or crashing, you may have memory problems. The easiest way to repair memory errors is to first run a Windows registry cleaner like RegCure, as sometimes a corrupted and bloated windows registry can cause all sorts of errors on your PC, including freezes and crashes.

The next step would be to actually replace your memory, as that will usually fix any RAM related problems, but you’ll want to run some tests first: One of the most effective memory tests you can run, has to be executed outside of windows, so you’ll need a bootable CD. The test is called Memtest86 and is Free! The longer you run this memory test the more accurately it can measure your RAM’s performance levels, and determine if any faulty memory needs to be replaced.

If you find that you need to replace your computer’s memory sticks, then head of to Crucial.com and use their memory advisor tool to locate the specific RAM you need for your PC. This will involve choosing your PC’s manufacturer and model number. Then go to Newegg.com to purchase your memory (much cheaper prices than crucial)!

Keeping a close eye on your hard drives and RAM with the programs we’ve mentioned in these first two posts can really go a long ways towards preventing any kind of PC disaster from even happening!

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PC Disaster #2, Hard-Drive failures

Your hard drive is one of the hardest working components in your PC next to your cooling fans, and will eventually fail over time. It is always better to be prepared to deal with Hard Drive failures ahead of time…and be ready to anticipate the failure rather than dealing with it after the fact. The easiest thing to do is to make regular backups of your hard drive. One software program that will ‘clone’ your drive for you is the Acronis True Image program (www.acronis.com), which costs around $80.

Backups should done in conjunction with a program that can monitor the health of your hard drive at an given time, and sound an alarm if something starts going wrong. Personal SmartCheck (www.urltoy.com) is a great program for monitoring your hard drive’s health. And it can be downloaded for a 30-day free trial before you have to spend the $20 to keep it if you like it. SmartCheck will even predict when your hard drive will fail,giving you ample warning to make necessary arrangements for replacement drive to be installed.

Of course, protecting an already working drive is easy, but what should you do if your hard drive has already failed and won’t spin up? Unfortunately, if the drive doesn’t spin up at all, then you won’t be able to recover your data. If your drive barley spins up but windows won’t start, you can use the Recovery Console to fix or restore it, or you could try BART PE Disk (www.nu2.nu) to try and gain access to windows and your data. Of course the 3rd alternative is to hire an expensive data recovery service to rescue your hard drive data for you, but depending on your data’s value, the recovery costs will be justifiable.

You can physically install a new hard drive easily enough, but you’ll have to reinstall your windows operating system once you do.

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