A few questions...

Hi
1)What is the difference between the 32 bit windows and the 64 bit version?

2)If i wanted to choose between getting vista and 64 bit xp what should I do?

3)When i play doom 3 it detects my settings as medium and it stutters a lot when i move my crosshair in the game. Is there anything wrong with my pc?

4)Can i install games on external harddisks and play them from there?

5)Is it bad to keep my system running 24/7 on A/C power?

6)My xp boots a little slow for some reason. When the windows loading screen appears & the loading bar passes by 10 times, then it shows me the welcome screen. Is there anything i can do about this? i have already tried bootvis. My old system(1.7 ghz P4, 256 MB SDRAM) booted faster than this system.

7)When i turn my notebook on i see the dell loading screen, then the www.dell.com screen. Is there anyway to get rid of the dell screen and to view my computer post?But i also need the dell.com screen for system restore.

8)Are dells good overclockers? Would you recommend me to overclock my system? How cool should my cpu be for overclocking it?

9)Is there anyway to view the temps of my Ati X1400?

10)Can i change the turbocache value to a set value instead of it randomly borrowing the system ram? Will this help me gain performance in doom 3?

11)I have seen a cooling pad in one of the shops here(I live in the UAE)They have many cooling pads costing AED 55, 100, 120 / US$ 12, 25, 32.
The one costing 12 dollars is made out of plastic and has two fans which sit in the middle of the pad. The other two as far as i remember are made out of metal. Which one would you recommend? There is also this thermaltake cooling pad which was a bit expensive, but thats ok. I just want to know a good one.

12)How often should one open the system and clear the dust as it is explained in the notebook dummy guide( how to clean your system)

Thanks a lot guys

Pankaj
aka
death__machine

 

I am not able to view my signature though i have updated it 2 times:S (can see it now )

Here are my system specs:
Dell Inspiron 6400
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.0 Ghz
2 GB 667Mhz DDR2
ATI X1400 128 MB
Windows Xp Home edition

 

13) Does decreasing the voltage as explained in the guide >How to cool down your notebook< decrease performance?

 

1. Ok lets think of it like this. A processor has one river of information that data flows though when it is a 32-bit processor. If your processor is a 64-bit processor it has two rivers and the water (data) is split between them as the data moves through the processor. 64-bit is faster and safer. However, hardware and software compatibility is not so good right not (although many would say that they are doing just fine with 64-bit, no problems). Also when you use a 32-bit OS, you not using that second river per say.

2. Did you know that all vista versions (except basic) have the option to be 64-bit. You have to buy vista from the store to get it (it comes with two discs: 1 32-bit and 1 64-bit upgrade)

3. Games are not really good at detecting settings in my experience (some better than others though). Lower the setting yourself and see if it helps.

4. Yes

5. As long as you keep the system cool and you restart every once and a while. Also, tell Windows to have a screensaver and to shut off your monitor after long periods of no use.

6. Not really sure. But there are a lot of reasons a computer boots slow.

7. I am not sure what you are ultimately asking. I know what screen your talking about though.

8. Overclocking is a risky business unless you know what you are doing. You have to keep your system very cool and you need to know what you are doing. As for Dells, I am not sure but I would guess no. Side note: overclocking reduces the life time of you components.

9. Google: Everest Home Edition. It is a freeware program that will give you a bunch of cool info on your computer.

10. Hmm. I cannot give you a definite answer on that right now.

11. Yep that sounds about right for cost. I am not an expert on cooling pads but a medal one should be able to grab the head a little better than plastic and dissipate it over its surface area while letting the fans cool the surface. As for quality, research. I (my mom actually) have Targus pad (plastic) that is Excellent.

12. About every 3 months. However if you notice it is dirty, do it.

13. Yes but not too noticeably.


Edits: I have made a bunch of edits and add ons, if you just now see this reload the page. I updated question 1 and 11.
--
Michael

 

I downloaded everest home edition but am not able to view temps of the gpu.

 

Im looking into it. (I have everest ultimate and that threw me off).

Does everything else make sense?

 

Yes it gives me details on my whole system...
It detects the graphics as 256 though it should be 128 maybe cause of hypermemory...

 

Well, i meant, did you understand the rest of my post? Did it answer you questions, do you have anymore?

Edit: Looks like Everest Home does not give you the info. Ill look.

 

7. Go into your bios and you will see a setting that say's quiet boot and you change it to whatever it is not. I have a Gateway and it did the same thing, exit and save the changes.

10. You should be able to do this by changing the Graphics Aperture Size to a different setting, i.e. 128 up to 256. However, I believe that turbocache borrows from system memory as needed so changing the value anything higher than 128 will not create any noticeable performance gains and it will still borrow when it feels neccessary.

 

Yes thank you ao much.
Just want a way now to set my hypermemory

 

I didn't realize you have XP. Provided you have an updated ATI Catalyst Control Center you can open this up and go down to the Turbomemory (I think) section at the bottom of the list in the main tree on the left and change the Graphics Aperture Size in the ATI CCC. You have to change the setting, then restart to take effect. Hope this helps.

 

Thank you for filling those in.

 

Turbomemory or anything related to memory is not present in the settings list(ccc)

 

Is there noway to check the temps of the card?

 

I will post about that bios setting regarding the startup screen tomorrow.
Thank you

 

I checked and it should say graphics aperture size if your card supports it. If it doesn't then It won't be there. It's in the latest ccc drivers from www.ati.amd.com . The bios setting is the other place you can check to change the default.

 

Hey i checked out my bios settings and there are no settings regarding the boot....
I hopefully am going to use a external harddisk in a month , so will it be slower than the harddisk in the notebook?And I am going to use the external hdd for games and music.

I plan to play half-life 2 in some time after purchasing..Will the game run on high settings? I saw a review of Xps m1210 and it played the game on high and i have a better config than the one in the review except for the processor.

This feels awkard and embarrassing but should i ask qs in new threads from now on?