When playing games, watching DVDs and manipulating digital images, you must make sure that you have right graphics card and it is set up to maximize your experience.

Avoiding slowdowns is not just all about your hardware and system settings. It also depends on how many programs you have installed and on how secure your computer is when connected to internet.

By “how many programs you have installed” I don’t mean that more software you install on your computer slower it will be.

Rather over lifetime of your PC, you will find yourself installing a portfolio of programs that you have bought, borrowed or downloaded. As this collection increases, so will collection of shortcuts in your automatic start-up list increase without your knowledge and approval.

As you add more programs that must be started when you switch on your computer, you will see a general degradation of performance and a slow down in boot-up times.

Spyware and viruses are a nuisance not only because they can steal or damage your data. They usually add processes that run in background and are completely invisible to you. They sometimes even fool Windows and your other security tools in thinking that they are legitimate programs.

How do you keep track of all this? Well, even most experienced users find it extremely difficult to control all resources and system settings of there computers.

They are constantly tweaking their PCs manually while using software that help them.

Next week, I will tell you how you can keep track of more important resources of your PCs and how to improve way they interact to give you more power at your fingertips.

Just as a sneak preview, though, hold this thought: there exist some nifty utilities, like SpeedUpMyPC, that give you automated tools that really boost performance of any computer.

Most laptops come with modular/swappable drive bays, to allow you to remove floppy drive, DVD drive, and even hard drive. This is very convenient if you often use different media for saving and storing data and need to make a change between media types but need to continue working at same time rather than having to shut machine down.

Some laptops come with a built-in AC power supply, so laptop plugs into a wall outlet with a simple ordinary plug-in, however many have power brick which is attached to AC cord and this can be inconvenient if you are working in a confined space. Often with more recent laptops you can by more compact device to make it easier to use laptop in small spaces such as hotel rooms.

Naturally laptops are purchased for their mobility to laptops will always come with one or two batteries to allow you to take laptop away from mains power. This means you can leave AC power cable behind and only plug it in to mains power when you need to recharge batteries.