Dos-Boot Computer Services Blog

For years there have been advertisements on TV for services that can vastly improve the speed of your computer by running a simple tool.
I saw one of these ads myself in the past couple of days. I was a little surprised that they’re still around and making enough money for a national TV spot.

A few of these sites are FinallyFast, DoubleMySpeed and CleanPC. I won’t link to them here, because they’re nothing more than scams. With names like “DoubleMySpeed”, they’re certainly tempting but there is no software available that will do what the name implies.

As a test, I went to all three sites listed above on a newly reloaded computer. Nothing other than Windows Vista was installed on the computer, so there were no viruses or spyware or really anything else to slow the system down. In short, it was running perfectly.
All three sites said that there were between 75 and 200 errors on the computer and to fix them it’d cost money.

Each site is installing rogue security software. The software that tells you that your computer has a problem (even if it doesn’t) and the only way to fix it is to pay them money. This is, unfortunately, the new way viruses and malware work. It’s all business, and their business must be paying off.

If you truly want to speed up your PC, and were considering one of these sites, do yourself a favor; Avoid the site and have the RAM in your system upgraded. It’s far more effective, trust me!

One of the biggest dangers to your computer is overheating. Excessive heat can cause the system to malfunction, your hard drive to crash or even damage internal components. Since we’re coming up on the dog days of summer, here are a few tips to keep your computer cool.

The first thing to check is that your computer’s fans are spinning and able to effectively cool the system. In laptops especially, the fans and heatsinks can get clogged by dust preventing the system from cooling itself, often causing it to shut down while you’re using it. Some laptops have removable panels allowing you to clean the fans, others do not. To clean, or to help keep clean, the fans use a can of pressurized air from an office supply store to blow out the vents on the sides and bottom of your computer. If your laptop hasn’t been cleaned for a while, you may want to have it professionally cleaned to prevent problems later on. You might be surprised how much dust it can pick up!

When using your laptop, make sure it’s on a flat surface and the vents aren’t obstructed. Move your computer to a cooler room or to a cooler place in the room if you don’t have air conditioning. Avoid leaving your computer in the direct sunlight, especially while it’s on.

Finally, remember that your computer is generating its own heat and raising the ambient temperature of the room. You can keep your room a little cooler by putting the computer to sleep or turning it off while you’re not using it.

Hello, all!

A quick heads-up: We will be closed Saturday May 29 through Monday May 31 for Memorial Day. We’ll be back on Tuesday, June 1 at 10:00am.

Hello, everyone!

Just dropping a quick line to let you know that we will be closed Thursday the 24th through Sunday, January 3rd so that we can spend time with our families.  We will be back on Monday, January 4th at 10am.

Thank you to all of our customers who have made 2009 a great year at Dos-Boot!  Have a happy holiday and we will see you in 2010!

Ryan