Well i been having lots of trouble with this computer and its only 2 years old some things is it overheats ALOT do to when the CPU is 100% when i do ctrl+alt+delete(viewing my CPU) and runs very slow all the time
MY QUESTION IS if i upgrade to windows vista duribng installation can i choose to delete everything from my computer?(games files everything)
ID:182414
 Jul 11 2008, 3:19 am
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well my uncle is a computer technician and he told me to get some second opnions he said the reason its overheating and such is all the useless files on my computer which is why he said when i do the installation i get something called "clean installation" which what he says wipes out my whole hard-drive which is what i want
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You can simply format your computer and install Windows XP all over again, which is a clean install for XP.
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great you have helped me alot i know this is the reason for my CPU always 100% which causes overheating. thanks alot.
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Naruto0727 wrote:
well my uncle is a computer technician and he told me to get some second opnions he said the reason its overheating and such is all the useless files on my computer which is why he said when i do the installation i get something called "clean installation" which what he says wipes out my whole hard-drive which is what i want Not to disparage your uncle, but a hardware guy should know better than to say that. Useless files have nothing to do with overheating. Overheating is a hardware problem, not software. If your computer is overheating, it's caused by one or more of several factors:
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If you bring up task manager and go over to the processes tab, you can sort by CPU usage, and see what is running 100%. "Useless files" wont make your computer overheat, but excessive CPU usage will, which isn't because of to many files, but rather too many programs running.
But even if your computer is running at 100% CPU, it shouldn't overheat. From the sounds of it you either have it in an enclosed space, preventing heat from escaping, or you have hardware failure, most likely a fan. It could just be a buildup of dust and grime, but two years is a very short time for something like that to happen. I've dealt with 5 year old computers that didn't build up enough dust to really matter, and they weren't in a particularly clean environment. | |
what about this every time i start up my computer i get this
dsca.exe has encountered a problem and needs to be closed we are sorry for this inconveience would this have anything to do with it. | |
No, a quick google search suggested that it is a standard dell program, probably preloaded on the computer. The fact that it is crashing suggests that there might be some problems with your install of XP. I would still suggest reinstalling Windows, but I it wont fix all your problems. The only computers that should be capable of overheating are hand built gaming machines, because of their extreme power, and use of new, unrefined, technology. So if your machine is overheating in an circumstance besides 90deg weather, something is wrong, physically, with your computer.
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Naruto0727 wrote:
great you have helped me alot i know this is the reason for my CPU always 100% which causes overheating. The CPU always being at 100% may contribute to overheating, but it won't cause the problem. Overheating is entirely due to hardware issues or the physical environment your computer is in. It should not happen otherwise, whether your computer is running flat-out at 100% or not. Saying a CPU running at 100% causes overheating is like saying not keeping your Civic washed and waxed is the reason it only gets 4 MPG. Of course a clean car gets better mileage, but something has to be seriously wrong with the engine for the car to be performing that badly. In this analogy, installing Vista over XP is like washing your car and then putting 200 lbs. of dead weight in the back. Lummox JR | |
I would just like to point out that overheating can also be a software problem. Software usually controls the fan speeds of your important components. CPU, GPU, north/south bridges. Case fans usually run by themselves, however.
Anyway, the problem could just be that either your CPU sucks, you have some sort of malicious files there keeping your CPU at 100%, or you need some more RAM. RAM stores files in there for later use, so the CPU doesn't have to constantly calculate this stuff. I suppose if you're trying to run XP with 256MB of RAM. It would help immensely if you were to post your system specifications. We can't diagnose the problem if we only know a bit of the facts. Go to start, run, and type in dxdiag. | |
SpikeNeedle wrote:
I would just like to point out that overheating can also be a software problem. Software usually controls the fan speeds of your important components. CPU, GPU, north/south bridges. Case fans usually run by themselves, however. Actually IIRC, the operating system and/or BIOS controls fan speed. Anyway, the problem could just be that either your CPU sucks, you have some sort of malicious files there keeping your CPU at 100%, or you need some more RAM. RAM stores files in there for later use, so the CPU doesn't have to constantly calculate this stuff. I suppose if you're trying to run XP with 256MB of RAM. A slow CPU still needs to be properly cooled in some way, no matter how slow. RAM will not alleviate the problem as it is a storage place for data which does not necessarily stores precalculated values (which you seem to be implying that it does). George Gough | |
SpikeNeedle wrote:
I would just like to point out that overheating can also be a software problem. Software usually controls the fan speeds of your important components. CPU, GPU, north/south bridges. Case fans usually run by themselves, however. True, although I would still consider that a hardware problem. Having extraneous foo running on your system won't screw with your hardware settings at all. While software can control your hardware and thus the two aren't entirely separate, usually those settings are highly optimized. Anyway, additional cooling fans or other measures to improve ventilation ought to solve the problem regardless. Lummox JR | |
KodeNerd wrote:
Actually IIRC, the operating system and/or BIOS controls fan speed. The operating system and the BIOS is considered software. A slow CPU still needs to be properly cooled in some way, no matter how slow. RAM will not alleviate the problem as it is a storage place for data which does not necessarily stores precalculated values (which you seem to be implying that it does). He's pointing out that his CPU runs at 100% all the time. As that's about all he's told us, I think he's just assuming that it's overheating, he's told us no other symptoms. I do believe that the CPU uses RAM, and if you don't have the needed amount of RAM to run whatever you are doing, it will also use hard drive space, slowing down your computer a lot. After this happens, if you try to do anything, your CPU will be using the hard drive space and swapping back and forth between your RAM, undoubtedly causing slowdown with a peak in CPU usage. [EDIT] I would just like to clarify this a bit more. I'm pretty sure the thread starter is confused when he talks about overheating. He doesn't seem to have the problems of overheating at all, instead he describes max CPU usage with slowdowns, not artifacting or spontaneous shutdown. This led me to believe he was just misuing the term. | |
SpikeNeedle wrote:
KodeNerd wrote: I misread your post and though you said that the GPU and CPU themselves regulate the fans. I do believe that the CPU uses RAM, and if you don't have the needed amount of RAM to run whatever you are doing, it will also use hard drive space, slowing down your computer a lot. After this happens, if you try to do anything, your CPU will be using the hard drive space and swapping back and forth between your RAM, undoubtedly causing slowdown with a peak in CPU usage. He did not specify what amount of RAM he had nor how much of it was being used so I assumed that swapping was not happening. George Gough | |
KodeNerd wrote:
He did not specify what amount of RAM he had nor how much of it was being used so I assumed that swapping was not happening. That's why I posted that it would be immensely more helpful if he posted his system specifications a few posts back. Swapping would help explain the reason for the slowdowns that he describes, and would be an easy fix of adding more RAM. | |
heres all information
OS-Windows XP HE(5.1,Build 2600) Language-English SM-Dell Inc. System Model-ME051 BIOS:pheonix ROM BIOS PLUS version 1.10 A08 processor:intel(R) pentium(R) M processor 1.70GHz memory-504MB RAM Page file-642MB used,1341MB available DirectX 9.0c(4.09.0000.0904 | |
Naruto0727 wrote:
Page file-642MB used,1341MB availableLooks like that "swapping" is happening, as the Virtual Paging File is holding a whopping 642 MB. (The virtual paging file is simply the storage of random access applications on the hard drive to make up for a lack of RAM to store the currently running applications. Which, of course results in slow downs, and the windows message bubble that pops-up saying that, "they're increasing the size of your virtual paging file," and that, "during this process, memory for some applications may be denied.") | |
Uh, Vista is not going to help you in any of those areas. It will only make performance issues worse; its system requirements are more demanding than XP. Vista has only been known to create problems for users, not solve them.
For a 2-year-old computer, if you have performance that bad already then you should do some serious checking for spyware.
Lummox JR