The Windows XP and Vista operating systems are often configured to automatically restart when a system failure occurs. However if the laptop restarts then it does not give you enough time to actually see the error message before the system restarts, and often the error message is extremely important to efficiently diagnosing computer issues.

The actual error message can be a great help so to prevent the system from automatically restarting you can follow these simple steps in XP.

Right click My Computer > click Properties > Advanced tab > Settings under Startup and Recovery > and remove the check mark from Automatically Restart in the System Failure section.

This may or may not be set by default in Windows XP depending on which Service Pack is installed on the particular refurbished laptops under 200 but it is good to check just in case you ever need to actually see the error message Windows is providing you before it automatically restarts. The error codes are often referred to as stop errors and when you have access to them it can be surprisingly easy to identify what the cause of the issue is simply by researching the code provided.

The system failure screen is known as the BSOD or Blue Screen of Death in the world of computer technicians and Windows operating system users alike. This is the dreaded screen you see which is all blue and has lots of cryptic looking wording in white letters on the screen. As bad as it sounds it can actually be quite easy to resolve the issue on laptops under 300 dollars as well as brand new ones when you know exactly what the error code being displayed is.

You can follow the steps in this laptop tip to see if the check mark is there meaning it will do the automatic restart, or if the check mark is not there meaning it will leave the error on the screen so you can get the necessary error code as well as information you need to help you begin to resolve the issue causing the system failure.

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The most common reason for laptops under performing to be running slowly in the computer hardware realm is simply a lack of having a sufficient amount of memory, especially in these days of resource intensive operating systems. Memory is RAM (Random Access Memory) and it is not hard drive space which is a common misconception among many computer users.

Hard drive space is permanent storage while memory is temporary storage, aka volatile storage. Data permanently stored on the hard drive is for example your pictures, your Word documents, your spreadsheet files, and things of this nature. The data stored in memory is the computer programs themselves for example, and they only need to be there when they are actually running. Once you turn off or reboot your laptop everything in memory is removed hence the term temporary storage.

Windows 7 and Vista laptops by design are in a much more resource intensive operating system environment than previous Microsoft operating systems such as the preferred Windows XP. The additional features, especially the graphic enhancements commonly referred to as eye candy require your computer system to meet additional system requirements meaning the hardware within your laptop such as memory and the processor.

One of the main points to be sure you cover is to have at least 1GB of RAM (system memory) installed in your laptop if you plan on running Windows Vista or later on it. This operating system will run on 512MB of memory as is stated in Microsoft’s recommended requirements which is different than the minimum requirements to actually install.

However laptops with Vista and only 1GB of RAM which is double the recommended requirements is going to handle not much more than very basic computing duties such as email, web surfing, basic office apps, etc. After this you will notice a very prominent reduction in overall responsiveness of your laptop computer, especially with any multitasking going on.

When you compare this to Widows XP which has a recommended requirement of 128MB of memory and a minimum requirement of 64MB, you should use the rule of thumb that in order to do the very basic computing duties you should have at least 512MB of memory.

Most refurbished laptops under 200 dollars for example have a decent amount of memory in them already as it is becoming rarer these days that there is an insufficient amount of memory in a laptop. As a matter of fact memory has become so inexpensive that people occasionally buy more than they actually need for what they do with their laptop computer.

Just because you can get an operating system installed and running on the minimum system requirements or the recommended system requirements does not mean that your laptop will be much fun using. The purpose of these requirements is to let the user know what the basic starting point is and certainly does not address overall performance.

We have seen many laptops under performing running Vista on only 512MB of RAM and the user suffers through such a slow and non-responsive computing experience. This does not have to be this way we will always inform them. A simple RAM upgrade will improve the speed and responsiveness of the newest cheap models as well as the laptops under 300 dollars making life much less frustrating.

For example running Windows XP on a laptop with only 128MB of memory which is the recommended system requirements will be a painfully slow computing experience and to run it on the minimum system requirements will basically be unbearably slow.

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The Power Management Wizard in the original Windows XP Professional operating system which was fully loaded on many new and Dell refurbished laptops is used to set various power management options which include sleep modes, power modes, and the low battery charge alarms as well. This can make it very easy for you to customize the settings on used laptops to fit your particular needs.

The setting Sleep Modes screen will allow you to define the Standby and Hibernate modes. In other words this is where you can go to enable or disable these modes on your laptop. You can also choose what the laptop will do when you close the LCD display. For example when you close the lid of your laptop computer you can have the operating system do nothing, enter Standby mode, or enter Hibernate mode. You may have special instances where these settings allow you to have your laptop remain active for longer durations at certain times.

You will also be able to select just how your used laptop will respond when you push the power button. Once again the selections are to have no action taken, enter Standby mode, or enter Hibernate mode. In addition you may be able to simply have the operating system shut done the laptop all together. One additional choice here is to have the operating system to prompt the user as to what they want to do at this time.

These are extremely handy and give the user a great opportunity to fully customize the power management of their laptop computer. This is not only good for cutting down on power consumption but it may just help extend the life of the computer since it can play a role in keeping it cool and extending the lifespan of the internal components.

Many of the used discount laptops under 200 today are high quality laptops which may have Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7 installed on the hard drive. The particular steps will vary slightly between the operating systems yet this type of setting can be located through the Control Panel among other simple means of your choice.

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Troubleshooting a new or refurbished laptops performance issue will often require taking a look at the system resources being used in the Windows Task Manager.

For example on an XP or Vista laptop the easiest way to open the Task Manager is to right click the Task Bar and choose Task Manager. The first tab which is called Applications is handy for discovering what actual applications are open at that specific point in time. This is useful because it can give an indication of what is causing the amount of Processes which are running. You can also see if any known spyware happens to be running as well.

The running processes are what you should really be interested in if it is a performance issue or there is suspected spyware infestation. Along the bottom of the Task Manager window you can see the number of processes running and you can also see the current CPU usage. If the system is basically idle your CPU usage should be very low as in basically zero.

If you just move your finger along the touchpad of your laptop computer then you will see the CPU Usage respond by going up a few percentage points. This is perfectly normal but if your processor is pegged at 100% then there is definitely a piece of software causing the performance issue. This is when I would look at the Processes running eating up the system resources in XP and other Windows operating systems.
If you click on the Processes tab next to the Applications tab you will then see the actual files and processes which are running as well as their PID, the amount of system memory they are using, and the percentage of the CPU they are using. This is where you can identify which file is using up system resources and 100% of the processor in this example.

You can sort the columns by clicking on the word CPU for example along the top of the Task Manager window. If you click on it once you will see it change from lowest to highest. System Idle Process will always show very high like 99% when no instructions are being sent to the processor.

However in this example if you were to find an application or file taking up a very large percentage of the new or refurbished laptops CPU power constantly, then you would be able to research and identify the file so that you could identify the application it is associated with. If it where spyware then you would know what you are dealing with and could progress accordingly. If it were an application which you intentionally use on your laptop computer then you would have to begin troubleshooting the particular application as to why it is eating up so much of the system resources and processing power.

There is a great deal more which can be done with the Task Manager when using it as a laptop troubleshooting tool. However this is just very basic information on how we use it when we are troubleshooting system resources on XP or Vista or basically any Microsoft operating system these days.

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