If you want to know if your computer can handle a certain game, run creative software smoothly, or how to figure out what's wrong, one of the first things to check is your graphics card. This hardware is responsible for rendering everything you see on your screen. If things feel slow or laggy, your graphics card may be the reason.

In most cases, you can find what kind of graphics card you have quickly, assuming you can power your computer on. Even if you can't, there are still a few options at hand.

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What graphics card do I have?

Knowing which graphics card you have can help you determine whether your computer can run certain games or handle creative work like video editing.

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