2,131 Tutorials

More Desktop PCs How-To

  • 01 September 2011

  • How-Tos: Upgrade a PC to make it fast, stable and secure

    Get your hands dirty, and you can get a lot more from your PC hardware. We look at how to tweak a processor, install a faster CPU, switch to a more powerful graphics card or cool things down for improved efficiency.

  • 24 August 2011

  • How-Tos: Build a Gaming PC for Under $1000

    When you build a gaming system, it should be all about frame rates. The reality, though, is that most people don’t have the unconstrained budgets to wring out the maximum performance a game can deliver.

  • 05 August 2011

  • How-Tos: How to liquid cool a PC

    A cooler PC will run smoother, faster and more quietly. Applying cooling components is fiddly, but worth doing. PC Advisor shows you how to liquid cool a PC.

  • How-Tos: How to overclock a desktop PC

    Overclocking used to be a dirty word, but with the two main desktop PC processor manufacturers now selling CPUs designed for speed-tweaking, it's now a tried-and-trusted upgrade. PC Advisor shows you how.

  • 28 July 2011

  • How-Tos: 5 More PC Upgrade Mistakes (And How To Avoid Them)

    As PCs get more powerful and easier to use, the challenges involved with upgrading them have remained about the same. For the novice, a hard drive upgrade can appear downright daunting. For more experienced tinkerers, the upgrade itself may be easy, but it's easier still to overlook factors that could streamline the whole process and better protect both the hardware and the data stored on it.

  • 21 July 2011

  • How-Tos: Benchmark Your PC

    Whenever you read a PC review or a component review, benchmark results typically accompany it. Such results are most often in the form of numbers, such as a score or a frames-per-second total. Sometimes they're relative, in that the result is posted as a multiple of some reference system or number.

  • 13 July 2011

  • How-Tos: Help Solve the Outlook 'General Failure' E-Mail Error

    Just over a year ago I wrote a post on fixing the "General failure" error that appears in Outlook when you click a link in an e-mail message. (The full error reads something like this: General failure. The URL was: "http://www.webaddress.com" The system cannot find the file specified.)

  • 11 July 2011

  • How-Tos: Save Money on Back-to-School Desktops

    If you're looking to buy a desktop for the new school year, and you're a student, a parent of a student, a teacher, or (in some cases) an alumnus, you don't have to pay full price. Plenty of computer manufacturers offer student discounts and education pricing--here are just a few.

  • 29 June 2011

  • How-Tos: How to fix a PC that can't download files

    My Packard Bell PC running Windows Vista is unable to download files. I've spent a lot of money on software to fix the problem, but it hasn't worked. I'm at a total loss!

  • 10 June 2011

  • How-Tos: PC Upgrades Almost Everyone Does Wrong

    Whether you're an experienced hand or a technophobic novice, chances are good that your last PC upgrade didn't exactly follow the industry's best practices. Many newbs flub upgrades through inexperience, but it's just as common to see a hardcore system builder throw caution to the wind while swapping out a CPU, snapping in some RAM, or swapping out a hard drive or graphics card. Whichever camp you fall into, cutting corners as you work on your computer puts it at risk of sustaining damage to sensitive components. In the worst case, you might even destroy the entire machine.

  • 08 June 2011

  • How-Tos: How to upgrade the hard drive on a PC with a SATA 1 motherboard

    A reader wanted to know why the 1TB SATA 2 hard drive he was attempting to install in his PC wasn't being recognised. Unfortunately his PC's motherboard is SATA 1: but that doesn't mean you can't upgrade the hard drive on an old PC - here's how.

  • 02 June 2011

  • How-Tos: How to troubleshoot a slow booting PC

    I upgraded my PC's motherboard, CPU and hard disk. Windows 7 64-bit now takes four minutes to load. By booting into Safe mode, I found that it's hanging at Windows\System32\Drivers\ClassPnp.sys.

  • 01 June 2011

  • How-Tos: What to do when an online PC purchase goes wrong

    With the reports today that MESH Computers is in difficulties, many PC buyers will be concerned about making an online purchase, and what to do when it goes wrong. Here's how to protect yourself when an online purchase appears to have gone wrong.

  • 27 May 2011

  • How-Tos: How to spring clean a dusty PC

    If you allow your PC's case to get dirty over time, grime can clog the fans that keep the internal parts cool. Here's how to avoid disaster.

  • How-Tos: How to restore Windows without the restore CD

    When Windows misbehaves, restoring the operating system via your restore CD may be the last resort. So what do you do if you can't find the disc?

  • 24 May 2011

  • How-Tos: How to speed up your PC: 24 performance tweaks

    We look at ways to give your PC a definitive boost of power, covering hardware upgrades, software tweaks and networking tricks.

  • How-Tos: How to troubleshoot and fix Windows problems from afar

    Microsoft's web-based remote-access tools let you quickly fix Windows problems on far-away PCs. PC Advisor outlines how to use them.

  • 17 May 2011

  • How-Tos: PC Liquid Cooling System: Build It Yourself

    The components inside your PC generate heat. Your standard heat-sink-and-fan combo is usually sufficient for the average user, but when you push your components harder, they'll run hotter. If you want to overclock your PC to the bleeding edge, you'll want to build a liquid-cooling system for your PC to ensure that your precious components don't burn out.

  • 11 May 2011

  • How-Tos: How to turn wireless connectivity on or off in Windows 7

    Want to connect your Windows PC or laptop to a Wi-Fi network but you're having problems? Try checking that wireless connectivity has been enabled on your device. Here's how.

  • 05 May 2011

  • How-Tos: How to install Windows on an SSD

    My computer dual-boots Windows XP Professional and Windows 7 on two one-terabyte hard drives. The XP drive contains many programs that I use frequently, but it often reports problems with applications not responding properly. To overcome this, I bought a 128GB solid-state disk (SSD) on which I'd like to install XP Professional and a few selected programs. The new disk has a drive letter and is ready for use, but I'm not sure how to set about it.

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