laptop advice on Hard disk drives
A hard disk in your laptop is like a cassete tape that you had songs on in the old days. For those who need a bit more help and understanding i will put in layman terms. A hard disk is like a big cupboard. Where do you keep all your paper files at home? In a desk or drawer , or even a cupboard. some cupboards are big and some cupboards are small.one cupboard maybe 2 foot another maybe 8 foot in size. its the same with a hard disk drive. A hard disk drive can be 200 gigabytes or 800 gigabytes. Actually a hard disk is similar to a cd rom only a hard disk is very dense and can hold more data.
Data are like bits of information computarized information. This can be letters ,images and so on. All these images and documents are stored by the laptop on the hard disk. Inside the hard disk is what looks like 2 cd roms. They are half the size of a cd like the ones you play on your music player and hifi. Data on the hard disk can be lost just like in the real world you can lose your paper files , therefore its good to make copies. A laptop computer stores files in bytes. You might store files in A4 or A3 documents. 1 megabyte is 1024 kilobytes. 1000 megabytes equals 1 gigabyte . Usually a hard disk on a laptop will be between 80 gigabytes and 500 gigabytes. Hard disks just like cupboards can be broken. A hard disk will usually last 4 years. Some hard disks can last up to 10 years. What makes a hard drive last longer its if you dont knock the laptop around.
Laptop Memory advice.
Memory inside the laptop are like extra hands that move information around the computer. The memory stores each bit of data in a capacitor within an integrated circuit. Only one transistor and a capacitor are needed per bit of information. Memory are like small drawers that move out of a cupboard and send files where needed. Lets imagine you click on a picture to view it. The picture may be 30 megabytes. So the mouse clicks the image, the software tells the processor that the image on the hard disk needs to be opened, so the chipset then says to the processor tell the graphics card to send data to the screen the data now needs to be expanded because you clicked on it. So the data needs to travel between processor memory graphics card and the bus or the (roads) on the motherboard. 
The processor may be pushing the information very quickly to produce the image but on this laptop because there is only 1 gig of random access memory or ram, the image is taking its time to be produced on the screen. so you wait for it to be opened. zzzzzzz However on your friends laptop he has 4 gigs of ram. Extra hands !!! Now things are going to really move fast. If you ever think of what memory does just think of it as an extra pair of hands. Instead of emptying the cupboard in 4 minutes you empty it in 1 minute. Increasing memory is the best way to speed up a laptop. Its also the cheapest. Some have mistakenly thought that increasing the size of the hard disk or processor will be the best way to speed up a laptop, ….no way. The best way to speed up a laptop and the cheapest way is to upgrade your ram ( Random access memory).
laptop advice on the Processor
The processor is the brains of the computer. It talks with programs like microsoft word and other programs then It has to interpret instructions that are sent to it by the memory. The processor does 4 things. It collects information, then it decodes the instructions, it executes the instructions then it writes back the information to the memory telling it what it has done. 
It works by using billions of switches. As the processor does an enormous amount of work. It needs to be cooled down. If a processor had the same power as your brain it would need a fridge the size planet earth on top of it to cool it down becuase of the amount of instructions sent. The processor in laptops really needs a more cooler system nearly everyones laptop gets hot. The fan only will come on when the processor is piping hot. On a desktop computer the cooling is much better.
Graphics card advice
The graphics card puts an image on your laptop screen. The processor says to the graphics card “quick need an image on screen” or something like this… the graphics card then works out the size of the image wether its in 3d how many pixels used, if it needs shading and lighting affects and so on. It paints an image the same as you would. First it draws a matchstick frame then fills in the colours. Th graphics card on a laptop gets piping hot. In fact the reason laptops break the most is becuase of graphics cards. 
Look at the chip with the number 2 on it. This is the graphics card.
The main reason for motherboards dying is becuase unlike memory and hard disks that can be replaced, graphic cards usually are moulded to the board when it was made and therefore cannot be removed. Also companies that make graphics cards are under pressure from large laptop companies. For example the big branded laptop company says we want to make a thin laptop will your graphics card and cooler fan allow us to build this thin laptop, or will the fan and graphics chip be thin enough to fit inside our new super thin laptop.
The graphics card company now is scared to say no or the company will take on a different graphics card. So graphics cards really need a better cooling system they get way too hot. Buying an air can and blowing out dust that clogs up the vents is really the answer to fix this big problem.
