System and method for recommending hardware upgrades

A method, comprising:

• allowing a user of a personal computer system to download a scanner application using a web browser on the personal computer system;
• reading scan data from the personal computer using the scanner application;
• formatting the scan data;
• encrypting the scan data;
• returning the scan data to a hosting web server;
• processing the scan data using a recommendation engine;
• and
• outputting a computer memory upgrade recommendation to the user's browser.

A method, comprising:

• accepting a user input to request a system scan;
• providing a control to the user to scan a user system;
• receiving results of the scan of the user system;
• and
• recommending an upgrade of the user system based on the scan.

A method, comprising:

• receiving data scanned from a personal computer;
• searching the scanned data for indicia of model, motherboard and chipset of the personal computer;
• processing the scanned data to generate a recommendation for a specific upgrade for the personal computer;
• and
• outputting the recommendation.

A computer-readable medium encoded with a software program, the software program adapted to execute the following:

• accepting a user input to request a system scan;
• initiating a first process to scan a user system to determine a first representation of scan data;
• initiating a second process to scan a user system to determine a second representation of scan data;
• and
• outputting the first and second representations of scan data.