TouchStone program checks PC's immune system

By Zatni Arbi

JAKARTA (JP): Have you ever felt helpless, not knowing what to do when your PC is seemingly working much more slowly than before? Or your hard disk is packed with unneeded files? Or a virus has successfully attacked your PC and occupied the boot sectors of your hard disk?

I'll also lay money down that the first thing you think about after buying a PC is making sure you got everything the computer store sold you: A CPU at least as fast as they said, a hard disk at least as large as they promised, and overall performance comparable to other PCs of the same price.

Two programs that I usually use for these purposes are PCTools and Norton Utilities (NU). Their System Information provides adequate tools for checking the configuration of hardware. They also provide several benchmark tests that can be generally relied upon.

Now there's a much more comprehensive test and diagnostic software that is suitable even for technically inclined people. The name is WINCheckIt, and it comes from TouchStone Software Corporation.

As the name implies, WINCheckIt is meant to be run under Windows. If you still live in DOS days, TouchStone has another package for you, called CheckIt.

Surgeon's probe

With the help of WINCheckIt, looking under the hood can become interesting and often dizzying. When the program is loaded, the screen displays real time data of how much of your hard disk space is used, how much of the largest memory block is available, how much system resource is free and how much free memory your system has below the one megabyte demarcation. All this information is displayed on the left.

On the right, WINCheckIt displays your system's hardware configuration. WINCheckIt has two methods of obtaining this data, and you can tell it which one to use upon loading. The program can collect the data and store it in a .CKD file or you can tell it to use an already stored .CKD file. More than one data file can be stored, and you can choose which one. Honestly speaking, though, I don't see the merit of this feature.

And then there is the hardware command, which lets you view the details of major system components for your system in a different window. You can see it on the bottom left corner of the illustration. On the left side of this window is a list box from which you can select to see more data about your system's hardware components. WINCheckIt will give details on your main system, video, memory, hard drive, floppy drives, COM (serial) ports, LPT (Parallel) ports, sound device, CD-ROM drive, input devices (keyboard, mouse, etc.), modem/fax, or CAS FAX, but not a scanner.

To my delight, WINCheckIt recognizes my current PC as "Ultra- high Performance PC". I just wonder, what would be the flattering comment this program would give a 90 MHz Pentium machine?

Paraphernalia for PC

WINCheckIt comes with several tools to keep your PC performing its best. First, there is the Tune up command. Unfortunately, there's not much information as to what this command actually does. The only thing that changed after I pressed the command button was that I had more Largest Memory Block below 1 MB.

Clean up allows you to clean up hard disks. You can specify what files you want to be displayed by their extension, their creation date or their size. You can also tell the program to list all files. You can tell it to search and display all files created on a specific date, prior to or after a certain date, or tell it to list all duplicate files. Once these files are displayed, you can proceed to select and delete them -- freeing more space on the hard disks.

Now, to make sure that your new PC has the processor power that you've paid for, WINCheckIt has a bench marking tool called Track Performance. As you can see on the bottom right corner of the illustration, the CPU on my system has a performance level almost equal to a 60 MHz Pentium machine. However, when the performance of the math co-processor is evaluated, the level drops to between a 386 33 MHz and a 486 50 MHz machine. That's not surprising, as my board only has a Cyrix 387 math-coproces sor.

Survival tools, too

Perhaps the most valuable part of the package is its Reference Library. It contains a glossary of technical terms such as shadowing, which goes so far as to explaining all available types for each component. For instance, it provides information on how much electrical power a typical component such as a sound board uses, so that you can determine how big our power supply should be. Reference Library also provides useful tips, including the procedure for partitioning your hard disk and performing low- level format on it.

Like PCTools, NU and other similar packages, WINCheckIt also has the Rescue Disk tool. When trouble strikes, a rescue or emergency disk can really save our day. To help us get rid of programs that we no longer need, Uninstaller is also included. And to help us fine tune our PC, System File Editor will allow us to view, compare and modify system files used by DOS and Windows.

Final take

WINCheckIt doesn't recognize my Fahrenheit 1280 graphics adaptor. What's even more funny, it thinks that I'm using a VESA adapter -- which the three year-old Fahrenheit 1280 definitely is not. WINCheckIt also fails to recognize my scanner, although a scanner is another type of input device. Furthermore, the program says I'm using a two-button mouse, while in fact I'm using a three-button trackball. More worrisome is the usability of the program to recognize that my system board has a separate math- coprocessor; the program states that the CPU has an integrated numeric floating unit, which is not true.

I understand that there are too many different hardware components out there for any test and diagnostics program developer to learn about, including their own products. Other programs, like PCTools and NU, also suffer from the same limitation. You should always keep this in mind when reading their reports.

WINCheckIt also includes an applet that has, in my opinion, a dubious value. Called Software Shopper, this applet gives us the list of software on the market -- hundreds of them. It includes rare ones like AudioView, Acropolis GL w/Cstm Rpt, Amber-Pro and Origin (V.2.8). The program will tell you whether your PC meets the requirements to run each of the programs on the list. It also lists the name, price, vendor and the phone number to call if you want a particular thing. The program might be more useful if it provided a synopsis of the purpose of each program. What would you guess the use of AudioView is? Audio data isn't usually viewed is it? Doesn't it sound like reading the newspaper with your ears?

The program's strengths are its Reference Library, Uninstaller and Clean Up applets, as well as its ability to detect potential IRQ conflicts. If you don't need any of these features, the time- tested PCTools or NU will do.

Finally, although the program provides us with tools to tinker with our system, remember as they say in the U.S.: "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". Many times I receive SOS calls from people who twiddle too much with their perfectly healthy PCs.