Your Workstation’s Most Valuable Tool
The HP Performance Advisor comes as a pre-loaded piece of standard software on all HP workstations, including the HP Z-Series and HP EliteBook Mobile Workstations. It's a free utility application, but it may well be the most valuable solution on your desk, allowing you to custom configure, tune, optimize, and more effectively manage and troubleshoot your workstation. The end result is better performance and greater productivity for you.
This is the first in a series of articles providing greater detail into the HP Performance Advisor and how it can help you work more productively. Future articles will focus on software optimization and performance monitoring and tuning, but this installment will be concentrating on the PA tools that help you understand, configure, and troubleshoot your computer.
Simple, intuitive interface
Access to information is key to effectiveness and productivity, and this is no less true at the micro level within your workstation as it is at the macro level of your company or industry. The HP Performance Advisor puts all the information you need about your workstation's configuration right at your fingertips, using a simple interface familiar to most Windows users. You don't have to dig or mine for the data in separate folders buried in your system folder or control panel. A mouse click or two lays it all out in front of you.
Detailed information at a glance
The HP Performance Advisor's configuration functions sit under the "Your Computer" icon on the Performance Advisor Splash Page. Clicking on the icon opens up a Block Diagram that allows you to easily locate the specific specifications and configuration data for the various pieces of hardware (processors, memory, graphics cards, and other major subsystems). You may also access a configuration page that details the systems installed in your computer, allowing you to drill down to very specific data that may be needed when considering upgrades, or troubleshooting your system down the line.
One example of the depth of configuration data available would be graphics card configuration data. Not only does Performance Advisor tell you what card(s) you have installed, who made them, their on-board memory capacity and video resolution capabilities, but also what driver is installed and for which applications the driver is certified. It will also tell you what other drivers are available for the card and what their certifications are, allowing you to make an informed choice as to which driver you wish to use. Installing those drivers can be done simply from within HP Performance Advisor, allowing easy and effective graphics configurations to suit your mission critical applications.
Configuration reporting - helping others help you
Accurately informing technical support personnel about your specific configuration can be critical in diagnosing and correcting issues that can crop up in even the best engineered workstations. HP Performance Advisor provides a simple way to gather all this pertinent data and to communicate it to tech support. HP Performance Advisor automatically compiles a configuration report that can be printed to file and emailed to tech support personnel, eliminating the need for endless question and answer sessions, and hunting through your system to find out what they need to know to help you.
It really can't get much easier than the Performance Advisor makes it to gain a complete and detailed understanding of your system configuration, communicate it to others, and perform custom configurations safely and effectively to maximize your productivity.
To find out more about the HP Performance Advisor, click here.
