Real life computer recomendations

[biss03]

yeah how do you perform a BIOS update? and while we are at it, what is a BIOS update? and what does it do?

 

also, what is a memory leak? i think i understand but want to make sure.

[Bullines]

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How do I perform a BIOS update for my computer?

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yeah how do you perform a BIOS update? and while we are at it, what is a BIOS update? and what does it do?

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Every mobo has a BIOS. It's like a very minimal set of instructions that allow your computer to detect/configure installed hardware and such and then pass control over to an operating system such as Windows.

 

The BIOS resides on a EEPROM, a ROM chip than can have it content modified. In this case, a flash BIOS update will re-write the existing data on your mobos BIOS chip. Flash updates can add new features or fix bugs on your motherboard.

 

To update (or flash) your BIOS, you must first know who manufactured your mobo. If your computer is from a company like Dell, Compaq, HP, Gateway, etc., visit their respecitve website and search for BIOS updates for your particular computer model. If you have a "whitebox" computer, you'll need to find out the manufacturer and model of your motherboard.

 

Things to keep in mind. You can permanantly wreck your mobo if you perform a BIOS update using the wrong version. Mobo manufacturers are making it safer and there are a few tricks for rescuing wrecked BIOS chips (not for the average user), but still...BE CAREFUL. Also, make sure you don't update your BIOS in conditions where power failure might happen (don't do this during a t-storm).

 

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also, what is a memory leak? i think i understand but want to make sure.

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It's not a hole in your RAM DIMMs, that's for sure

 

Simply put, it's a programming oversight. Many high level languages, like C/C++, allow programmers to directly allocate memory for their use. If a programmer allocates a block of memory to store data but then forgets to release that block of memory once it isn't needed anymore, that memory block is "tied up" and is no longer accessable by the program or the system. If the logic of the program does this often, the whole system will eventually run out of memory and you'll be forced to reboot Make sense?