A common misconception is that—with all else being equal—a computer with a processor running at, say, 3 GHz, will naturally be faster than a 2 GHz system—and the companies like Intel or AMD that just sold you that 3 Ghz PC wouldn’t have it any other way.

amd

Sure, that new Phenom you’re drooling over does seem a whole lot faster than your one-year-old machine when you play with it in Fry’s, but how much is due merely to the processor’s clock speed, and how much is determined by other factors?

Naturally, the increased processor speed is an obvious benefit in some specific circumstances, such as when you’re applying lens corrections to a few hundred digital photos, creating a PDF from a 400-page document, or playing a particularly processor-intensive game.

But in most cases, a faster processor alone won’t get you your email any faster, load a web site any sooner, or get your articles to the publisher when it’s actually due.

intel

If you think about it, your qualitative assessment of your PC’s speed is based on its  ability to respond immediately to mouse clicks and keystrokes, start applications quickly, open menus and dialog boxes without a delay, start up and shut down Windows quickly, and display graphics and animations smoothly.

For the most part, all of these things depend on the amount of system memory (RAM) your PC has, the speed of your hard drive, and the prowess of your video card as much as—if not more than—the speed of your CPU.

hard drive

Probably the biggest drag on an older PC’s performance, and the main reason it may seem so much slower than a new system—not to mention slower than it might’ve been only last year—is the glut of applications and drivers that have been installed.

Any computer that has been around for a year or more will likely suffer a slowdown, a problem that can either be remedied by some of the tips we mentioned here like hard disk defragmenting.

So, if you’re wondering how much faster your PC will be if you replace your 2 Ghz chip with a 3 Ghz chip, the answer is: don’t even bother unless you will upgrade your hard drve, RAM, and motherboard to complement the new CPU.

Ben Carigtan shows you how it’s done!