pc performance degrading

[azzu]

hi just a quick one here, is it possible that the hardware on a pc wears out over time? when first bought my pc (3.4 ghz pentium 4, 2 gb ram) it was very fast, these days it runs quite slow even after formating/re-installing software on the hard disk. is it time for a change in cpu/ram, or am i doing something wrong when wiping the hdd?

cheers

[icecube]

HI Azzu

What chipset is on the MB? VIA or intel-- you might have forgotten to install the MB drivers. I know if you forget the VIA 4 in 1 drivers you'll have a real dog.

The other thing that can make a system slow is some bad files. check for errors on the hard drive. Right click on the drive and go to properties. Click on tools and check error checking and reboot.

Check your bios to see that SMART checking is enabled for your hard drive. Real slow systems are a sign of a drive going bad.

If you have a Dell computer, f12 on boot gets you to a menu where you can go to utilities and check your system out. Select hard drive test.

Hope this is of some help

[liljim]

There is always that possibility that hardware wears and doesnt perform like it used to. Most often though, its newer software thats more demanding, more updates and patches, and things of that nature that can slow down a system. Another thing to take into consideration is heat, fans will absolutely slow down and heatsinks will clog up with dust. If your pretty familliar with pc's its good practice to break the machine down and give it a good cleaning. Just blowing it out from time to time isnt enough. Every 6 months or so i break mine down to an empty case so i can get all the crap out of the video and cpu heatsinks and the power supply.


As far as worn hardware, memory and HDD's are the 2 that would be the culprit. Not much can be done with memory other than replacing it but there is an option for hard drives.
A low level format on a hard drive can sometimes get the seek times back to what they once were. More info can be provided as needed but it writes zeros to the hard drive, COMPLETELY erasing it. This puts it in the state that it was shipped from the manufacture, absolutely nothing on it. If its been re formatted several times and installed on, a low level format wouldnt hurt.