what determines the speed of a PC, is it the processor, hard drive or both?

Question

my pc has gone progressively slower to the extent that I have to turn it on and go to shower while it boots. its getting worse.
Any suggestions please

Answer 1

You need to defragment your hard drive, as you install and use you pc , things get stored onto your hard drive in random segments, if the pc has to go from one place on the hard drive to another to run a program it will slow your pc down dramatically, particularly on your pc start up, so once every few months defrag your drive, all this does is copy all the files and place them together with there other program parts. You defragment by clicking on the following in order
`start`
`applications`
`system tools`
`defragment`
run the defragmentor WHEN YOUR NOT USING YOUR PC, very important as programs cannot be running at the same time or it wont do the job properly, and also it takes a fair bit of time, so best to do it over night whilst you sleep.
Hope this helps.

Answer 2

The more you have running in the System tray where the clock is the slower it will boot and run. Many of the items there are not required for normal running and can be switched off. Click Start > Run and type msconfig Now click the Startup tab and you have a list of programs that load when windows starts. Untick things like Quicktime and Real player and anything else you recognise but dont use everyday. Dont worry as you can always come back and re-tick them. Click OK and when it prompts you restart the computer. You will get a box informing you that you are in selective startup. Tick the dont show again box and OK. Now see how much you have improved your speed.

Answer 3

The processor is the primary source follwed by the amount of RAM your system has as mentioned by previous answers - HOWEVER, it is highly likely that the reason your PC is running slowly is because it is multi tasking a huge number of processes all at once. if you are not technical a superb little programme called Advanced windowscare V2 will run on your system, find any problems and give you a plain english summary allowing you to sort the problems. The best news is it's free for personal use - find it at www.download.com

Answer 4

The processor and RAM determine the speed of the PC. Increasing the RAM will help increase the speed. The more the amount of RAM will help speed up your PC. Hard Drive is only for storage. Disk defragmenting and fixing any errors on your hard drive may also help improve your speed.

Answer 5

Assuming you are still running the same applications and your machine is getting slower it is probably because over time you have collected all sorts of programs that run at start up (eg quicktime, real player etc). Also over time the registry gets clogged up. My best suggestion is to back up your personal data, game saves etc and then format your hard drive and reinstall from scratch. I do this every 6 months or so and it seems to help.

Answer 6

CPU and RAM

and also the number of programs you have running - they all have to start up

how long since you error checked you unit/ and disk defrag??

START
My Computer
right click – Local Disc (C:)
left click – Properties
choose 2nd tab – TOOLS
error Checking – click CHECK NOW
put check marks in both boxes
click – START (NOW- you will probably get a message saying you need to restart your computer – because this program wants to be the BOSS! – click YES)

also from here
Defragmentation – click Defrag Now
Click – Analyze – within seconds it will tell you if you need to - - if it says you are ok – FINE – if not – defrag – this will put
files back into closer proximity to make them work faster – when complete

restart your computer to make Scan Disk work

Best of Luck, James

Answer 7

speed is the processor
hard drive is the amount of storage
ram determines how many balls it can juggle at one time.
of course all these things determine how fast and accurately your pc will run.
the more you have of each of these the better it will run. if you want something that can do many tasks at one time without losing any speed then go for something with a dual core processor

Answer 8

the speed of the pc is driven by its CPU and then how much RAM is available - the harddrive speed does effect the time that it takes to save/write to the harddrive...

if playing intensive games then the graphics card can also effect the speed- many decent graphics cards also now have onboard RAM to keeps things smooth.

Answer 9

PC speed determines whole pc, not just cpu or hdd or memory, everything

that you have slower computer is because you have some virus
scan your computer and see is there difference (use NOD32)
http://www.eset.com/ - NOD32 official site

if that didn't helped then try some registry fixing tools (try Registry Cleaner - its good)

Answer 10

Defragging the hard drive may help, but I'd think about reinstalling your OS and apps. You could try scanning for viruses & spyware, uninstalling unwanted apps etc, but it's probably quicker to bite the bullet and reinstall.