General pc knowledge, need help with speed and power.

arowe199102

Solid State Member
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Location
united states
I know a decent amount about computers but I need help In speeding up my computer for faster downloads, more power for gaming,movies and multiple applications up at once. Can someone help? Also I have a 1/2 TB external hard drive that has my downloads on it.
 
It runs on windows 8, memory-
  • 4 GB DDR3

  • 2 DIMM
  • Hard drive
    500 GB SATA (7200 rpm)
  • Graphics-
    AMD Radeon HD 7340 (4 GB GDDR3, up to 2 GB)


---------- Post added at 05:45 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:40 PM ----------

Also I have 1/2TB external hard drive and dual monitors.
 
What CPU?

If you want to play recent games, your graphics card needs to be replaced.
 
What are your full specs OP? CPU, PSU etc

Also the external hard drive you keep mentioning will limit your downloads if you are downloading direct to that. There are a few factors when it comes to downloading which would be. Your isp, down/upload speed, where you are actually downloading from and the overall bandwidth of your system. For instance if you downloaded to internal SATA 2 HDD it would recieve data better than an external SATA 2 HDD due to it usually having to go over a USB connection. Plus you mentioned you have a 500GB SATA HDD. Is that just standard SATA and not SATA 2/3? If so then there is another factor to take in to consideration.

As also mentioned 8GB of ram these days is normal for gaming not because games will use it (Most don't get near 4GB. Very few infact) but will allow your systems OS to cache more from your HDD to your system ram. Therefore giving your programs/games faster access overall for your system.

Another thing already mentioned is your GPU is a low performer. One, because it only has GDDR3 (And not GDDR5 like the more powerful cards). And two, because you are running dual screens off such a low end card. When you say your card is "AMD Radeon HD 7340 (4 GB GDDR3, up to 2 GB)". You mean it's a 2GB card but can use up to 4GB. Which basically means if any application/game uses over 2GB of your graphic cards dedicated memory it will then utilise what it needs from your systems memory. Not really such a good thing considering you are only running 4GB total system memory.
 
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Well I got all my previous information off the hp website. Id like to be more technically sound when talking about this stuff but I'm pretty clueless. But I download directly to my computer then saves it to the External hard drive to save pc memory. If I upgrade my graphics card what would be good and inexpensive? Should I upgrade my processor as well? I appreciate all the feed back and help!
 
Isn't that videocard a mobile chip? Your computer is a laptop? They have limited upgradability. You may be able to replace the CPU, as long as cooling is upto the job of the faster chip. It's possible although unlikely you can replace the GPU. Memory and HD are two things you can upgrade, but it means selling what you already have.
 
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