Either because it's been a long time since you updated it and you don't remember what components your PC has; or you want to know the exact details, when it comes to wanting to improve it it is vital know what components your PC has. There are many reasons to upgrade a PC and the top three are graphics card, CPU and RAM.
Knowing what components your PC has helps give you a framework in which to maneuver. The first of all is to write down the components of which it is made up and there are several ways.
Table of Contents
Know components of your PC through the operating system
The easiest way to know what components your PC has such as the CPU, RAM or graphics card; is to look at the specifications given by the operating system itself. One way is in the Windows 10 and Windows 11 File Explorer, right click on the section This team and then on About this Computer, which will give us the following screen.
That is where we will be able to know what CPU, Operating System and amount of RAM it has. To find out what graphics card your PC has, click on Advanced System Settings, open the Hardware section in the window that is going to open, and then open the Screen Adapters section. We will see both the graphics card that our computer has and what level of integrated graphics It has our CPU, so it can work without a graphics card.
So we can know the names of the key components of our PC. But the drawback is that if we do it to improve our PC, we must know our components in detail, to know for sure which components to improve.
Use CPU-Z to get to know our components in depth
CPU-Z is free software that performs an instant and thorough recognition of your PC's components to give a complete table full of details. After downloading it, decompressing it and activating it, CPU-Z will show us an extensive table of contents of our PC.
First of all, there is the CPU section.
It will not only give us the exact name of the CPU in our PC, but it will also tell us its code name, power in watts, the type of motherboard platform, the size in nanometers of the manufacturing technology, the speed at the one that is working at this moment and the cache sizes L1, L2 and L3.
The second section of CPU-Z is the motherboard section, possibly the most important and underrated of all. It will give us the name of the manufacturer, model, the PCie protocol number that our motherboard has for both the CPU and the graphics card, and the version of the BIOS.
In the memory section it will tell us what type of memory we have, be it DDR3, DDR4 or DDR5; if it is in a channel or dual, the size, and the latency that it has.
Finally, there is the graphics section. CPU-Z will look at both the CPU's integrated graphics and any graphics cards you have connected. It will tell us its consumption, its memory capacity, the type of GDDR memory it has, and the bus bandwidth.
After all this, we carefully point out the details that interest us in the face of a possible improvement in our PC. It will be a very useful guide to know which components of our PC are at a clear disadvantage and which one we will need in order to have a better PC.
What components of your PC to improve and how
Now that we know the components of our PC, you have to know what it means to change each one of them.
Change a CPU
Precisely, the CPU is the most complicated to change and what that implies. Let's say we want to go for a mid-range Intel Alder Lake CPU to take advantage of the multi-core design. Yes or yes, it will be time to buy thermal paste for the heatsink. Then, that the connector of the heatsink is adapted so that the cooling is correct so as not to cause problems. Very surely we will have to choose the motherboard with the correct memory model, since there are some that accept DDR5 and others that only DDR4, and also we must take into account if the CPU that we have is compatible with our current memory modules, with what that if we're still using DDR3, we'll likely need to upgrade to at least DDR4.
Thus, change a cpu In some cases it is practically changing the entire PC. It is the most important piece and requires a matching motherboard, a suitable heatsink and thermal paste, and compatible memory if the generational leap is so great that there has been a memory format change. Of course, you can not change the graphics card and keep the one you already have.
Upgrade RAM
In the case of wanting to improve your RAM, it is vital to know which one your motherboard uses, be it DDR3, DDR4 or DDR5. You'll have to stick with it if you don't want to have to buy a motherboard and another CPU. As of today, the 12th generation Intel Core Alder Lake, the 13th generation Raptor Lake and the AMD Ryzen 7000 generation are the generations of the main manufacturers that support the DDR5 format. When changing RAM memory format, such as going from DDR3 to DDR4, it does require having a compatible base plate along with a CPU that matches the motherboard, and previous RAM modules cannot be reused.
If you want to have more memory, keep an eye on the DDR format of the modules you are going to buy, and buy pre-established memory packages. Either a single channel memory or several dual channel modules so that the workload is better distributed and the motherboard is not stressed.
Switch to a better graphics card
If you want to change to a new graphics card, changing it is much easier. Unless you opt for the more premium high-end like the NVIDIA RTX 3080 or 3090, a motherboard that still uses PCIe 3.0 can support data transfer with minimal bottleneck. There is the case of the recent AMD RX 6500 XT, which has a shorter PCIe channel than PCIe 3.0 boards, which causes a more pronounced bottleneck.
It is possible that if your power supply is very low, you may need to change it in order to use the graphics potential of the card. Unfortunately, neither CPU-Z nor the operating system can know what the power of your power supply is, so in this case you have to open, know the model and with that find out how much power it has and if you are going to need more to put a new graphics card.
