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Hardware Acceleration

Today, almost all software applications use multimedia graphics, audio, video, animation and text to make using the PC an enjoyable experience. This demand for processing power has lead to the manufacture of powerful video and graphic cards. Windows allows you to specify the performance of the graphics hardware present on your PC with the Hardware acceleration tab.

All applications have different Hardware acceleration requirements, depending upon their function. Some symptoms of wrong hardware acceleration settings include corrupt images, problems converting videos in MPEG and DVR formats, mouse pointer problems, difficulty playing video files in different media players, jerky videos and applications running slowly or failing to run at all, and display problems with graphics in games. This problem can be especially profound on older PC's, but adjusting down the acceleration on a newer PC can be tremendously helpful in resolving some of these problems.

To turn down the hardware acceleration in Windows XP:

1. Right-click on your desktop in any available free space.
2. Click on "Properties" in the drop-down menu.
3. Click the "Settings" tab and then click on the "Advanced" button.
4. The Advanced Settings dialog box appears.
5. Click on the "Troubleshoot" tab.
6. Move the "Hardware Acceleration" slider two marks left of "Full" to "Disable all cursor and advanced drawing acceleration. Use this setting to correct drawing problems."
7. Click "Apply," then "OK."
8. Close the open windows and try your program again.

To turn down the hardware acceleration in Windows VISTA:

1. Right-click on your desktop in any available free space.
2. Click on "Personalize" in the drop-down menu.
   
3. Click the "Settings" tab and then click on the "Advanced" button.
   
4. The Advanced Settings dialog box appears.
5. Click on the "Troubleshoot" tab.
6. Move the "Hardware Acceleration" slider until it is one notch to the right of "None." If no slider is visible, then your current display driver does not allow changes to be made to hardware acceleration settings.
   
7. Click "OK," then "Close."
8. Close any open windows and try your program again.

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