I was not happy with the windows experience index rating of my old notebook. It was showing 2.5. My friends those who have a new one are quite happy with rating around 5. So I decided to set the index rating manually of my choice. You can use the method described here to manually set your PC's Windows Experience Index rating without adding any hardware.
The Windows Experience Index provides the user a score of a given machine based on overall performance capabilities of that machine.
The trick here, off course is not going to enhance your computer's performance in any way. But you can joy with the rating of your choice or you can use it to cheat your friends.
Follow the steps below.
Step 1
Open the folder C:\Windows\Performance\WinSAT\DataStore
Step 2
Find the file that has name like Formal.Assessment (Recent).WinSAT
If the file does not exist then look for Formal.Assessment (Intial).WinSAT
If both file exists then select the latest modified file.
Step 3
Open the selected file with Notepad.
Step 4
Go to Edit->Find. Search for <WinSPR>
You will have something look like this
Step 5
Just after this <WinSPR> you can see <SystemScore>3.5</SystemScore>. By changing the number in this tag your overall windows rating will get changed. The number must be within 1 to 7.9.
You can also change other ratings also. Tags are
<SystemScore>Overall rating<⁄SystemScore>
<MemoryScore>Memory (RAM) rating<⁄MemoryScore>
<CpuScore>Processor rating<⁄CpuScore>
<GraphicsScore>Graphics rating<⁄GraphicsScore>
<GamingScore>Gaming Graphics rating<⁄GamingScore>
<DiskScore>Primary Hard Disk rating<⁄DiskScore>
But make sure that SystemScore is minimum of these tags. For example if you have set SystemScore 5.0, all other tags should be greater than 5.
Step 6
Now, save the file on your desktop with the same name. Now cut the file from your desktop and paste in folder C:\Windows\Performance\WinSAT\DataStore
Replace the file if already exists. Click on continue button if asked for administrative permission.
Important: Do not "Re-run the assessment" after doing this otherwise it will again show your original index rating.