Trouble with PC

[senorcrunch]

Recently a friend gave me his old gaming computer and a few older computers to scrap for parts (Hard drive and disk drive)
I have been having an issue with the computer being slow (at startup, when running multiple applications and tried running Arma2 but it seemed bit choppy)
Below I will post my specs:

Motherboard-MSI P35 PLATINUM
Processor-Intel core 2 Duo
Ram- 4GB DDR2
GPU- Nvidia GEFORCE 8800 GTS

I would very much like to know what I can do to make this computer run faster and run the games it should be able to run smoothly, I have been starting to think that it may be a problem with the hard drive as this was one of the pieces my friend removed to put into his new computer. Could this make sense? If you need anymore information just let me know.
Please someone help! And thank you very much.

 

[Wolfshadw]

First thought would be that there is too much running in the background. A format and re-install of Windows would be in order. This removes any unnecessary programs from even being installed on your system, let alone running in the background.

Second thought would be that while you state 4GB of RAM is installed, check to make sure that your system actually recognizes both (or all four) RAM modules. Note that if you're running a 32-bit OS, your system will only report between 2.5GB and 3.2GB of RAM available. This is normal and tells us that all 4GB of RAM is recognized.

Additionally, you need to clarify which components you have. There are a lot of Intel Core2Duo processors. There's going to be a big difference between Intel Core2Duos E4300 and E8600. Also there are three flavors of the Geforce 8800GTS; the older (G80) GTS-320 and GTS-640 and the newer (G92) GTS-512.

Finally, there are X-Factors that need to be resolved: What Power Supply is installed and how old is it? What is the case cooling system like? When was the last time it was dusted/cleaned out? Was the system ever over-clocked?

-Wolf sends

 

[JMer806]

Also, what kind of games are you wanting to play? That PC isn't going to play modern games on good settings, TBH.

 

[Poprin]

I'm in a similar boat as you and have posted with similar issues. I have an E6600 dual core and an Asus P5n32-E board + 2GB of RAM all stock no overclocks.

I would say check your HDD, if it is random one out of an old PC it might be SATA 1 with a real slow access time. This is going to ruin your day when using the page file. Also if your machine is second hand / ageing give it a tidy and a dust inside (be careful of course) and make sure it's got room to breathe and it's not running too hot. Also it might be worth re-applying the thermal paste to your CPU and re-seating the cooler as I have had this exact problem with my system and was the root cause of my performance problem. I have since fitted an Intel SSD and am in the process of sourcing an E8500 and extra RAM. But even after the tidy up and sorting the temps out with the SSD in I can now run Crysis on medium / high detail 1080p with no slowdowns at all and only with 2GB of RAM.

 

[smorizio]

if the drive had data and apss when he gave it to you it could be windows has some damaged files or a virus or spyware. when i give a pc away I wipe the drive bare and give the os disk to the new owner. if you have windows cd i would wipe the drive and start fresh. I would get the drivers for the mb and network card and sound card and put them on a usb stick first.

 

[swifty_morgan]

it pretty much depends on your processor and that old video card. both need to be reasonably good to play arma.

 

[PanicMaster85]

arma is a really badly coded game even a 680 can barely pull 60 on it just because its a complete train reck of a coded game, as for the start up definetely reinstall windows and if you have any antivirus try disabling it or uninstalling it for a little while to see if it speeds up... though you should have reinstalled windows when you built it it will save all your files on a file called windows.old etc