Speccy: An Easy Way to Check Your PC's Performance

The young woman is a self-confessed computer illiterate.  She takes the view that she doesn't have to be personally clued in.  She knows me.

She had been halfway through her homework, when her computer first crashed. It had unfortunately taken part of her essay with it. 

She had responded in precisely the correct way, using the method employed by everyone from nerd geniuses through to utter noobs.

She swore at the monitor, waited for it to switch back on and hoped that the problem had gone away.

This is the fail-safe 'have you tried turning it off and on again' strategy. Not only does that often work, but it would also allow her to say 'yes', when it would be the first question that I'd ask of her.

It didn't go away.  Over the next few days, she faced the Blue Screen of Death several times. She eventually surrendered to the inevitable and came into Skype looking for me. 

She couldn't have chosen a better time. I wasn't alone. Also in the call with me was a man who'd spent his teenage years building computers, and most of his spare time writing programs to run on them.  Completing our trinity was a woman who works on the Apple Mac service desk. The geek conversation was already in deep cyberspace, when my friend nervously joined us.

Once we'd established that she had indeed turned it off and on again, there was a barrage of questions about spec. Followed by silence.  Then a groan. This was a woman who'd previously struggled to find a fuse in a plug, now she was being asked about graphic cards, CPU and the core temperature of her PSU.

I waited for her cringing and apologetic protests to abate, then reminded her that last time something had gone wrong, I'd made her download Speccy.  Was it still on her computer?

There was a short gasp and the lack of verbal response this time felt more hopeful. 

Half a minute later, she proudly pasted into the text chat her entire software specification. It was followed by an instant chorus in three voices. We had spotted the problem immediately and we knew just how to fix it.

Speccy finds your computer spec for you. In other words, it hunts down and lists all of the specifications and components which make your computer work.

The front page (as captured in the image above) provides an overview. 

This is what my friend copied for us geeks to pore over after clues to the origin of her repeated shut-downs. She had to do nothing more than open Speccy to get that.

For more detailed views into each component, the menu on the left-hand side provides the links.

I love Speccy for two reasons.  The first is that it can be used so easily that it means computer illiterate friends can get that information to us. The second is the temperature sensor.  This might be a small, nifty program, but that is an extremely accurate gauge!

The program has been developed by Piriform.  I know it appears that everything that I recommend is from them, but they really do make great software.

I don't set out to merely download everything that the company makes.  I'll discover things for myself, or follow a word of mouth recommendation, only to learn that it's Piriform once again. You stop being so pleasantly surprised after a while.

I found Speccy after posting on a Tech Forum.  I'd included a screenshot of my own computer's temperature in order to illustrate my point. 

One of the replies came from an extremely technology savvy man (one of the moderators in fact).  He disdained the program that I'd previously used to determine it.  He informed me that Speccy contains a far more accurate temperature sensor.

I downloaded it and, after the obligatory 'oh it's Piriform again' moment, had a flick through and liked what I found. 

Shortly afterwards, I was in my local computer repair shop (totally different issue - I was buying a gamer headset).  One of the technicians there was working on a PC and I happened to glance across.  He was running Speccy, as his first port of call to determine the problem!

Author Kyle MacRae has a very easily digested style of writing.  He borders upon the utterly irreverent at times, making it not only an informative, but utterly hilarious book to browse. 

I've just opened the manual to find an example and there's one in the first line.  He's provided a timeline of computing and computers starting with:  '500BC Ernie the Egyptian invents the abacus. Blame him.'

Haynes Computer Manual is also fully illustrated and doesn't assume any prior knowledge. You could build a PC from scratch following his instructions, so you would certainly be able to use it to understand what Speccy is telling you!