Just as your car runs better when it’s properly maintained, so does your computer. You’ll be amazed at how fast and trouble-free your computer will be if you take just a few minutes once or twice a month to clean out the junk that accumulates on your hard drive and makes your computer run sluggishly.
You don’t need to hire an expert to maintain your computer nor do you have to be a computer technician yourself. There are many excellent maintenance programs available that are free, easy to download and easy to use. Once you've installed them on your computer, run the programs whenever it’s convenient and your computer will stay in tip-top shape.
The trick is knowing which programs to download and run. There are many maintenance programs on the market that are costly, do little good, and may even cause problems. Others are outright scams and can turn your computer into a relay station for spammers. Don’t worry. All the programs I’ll tell you about are from reliable, reputable companies, and most of them are free.
PLEASE NOTE: I have a Dell computer with a Microsoft XP operating system. My browser is Internet Explorer 7.0. If you have a different operating system or browser, some of the information provided below may not be applicable.
DISCLAIMER: I do not profess to be a computer technician. I am, however, a very experienced computer user. Over the years I’ve accumulated a cadre of tools that keep my computer running smoothly, efficiently, and relatively problem-free. Regardless, use my computer advice at your own risk.
REDUNDANCY: Some of the tasks in the following list are redundant. For example, CCLEANER and Microsoft’s Windows Live OneCare do many of the maintenance procedures automatically that I also show you how to do manually. Even so, it’s a good idea to do the maintenance manually from time to time.
ONE MORE THING: You don’t need to do everything listed below all at once. Just follow a few recommendations each day. In a couple of weeks your computer will be running like new again!
There’s another reason why you should limit your computer clean-up to just a couple of sections daily. Should anything go wrong (for instance, you might have a power failure while your computer is in the middle of a file clean-up routine), you can easily restore your operating system to the way it was earlier, without having to redo all of the maintenance tasks you had completed in previous days.
If you ever have to restore your computer system to an earlier date, it’s very easy. Just click on START, PROGRAMS, ACCESSORIES, SYSTEM TOOLS, and SYSTEM RESTORE.
CLEAN OUT UNNECESSARY FILES
This is the best place to start your computer tune-up. Download CCLEANER at:
CCLEANER is a FREE, safe, and easy-to-use maintenance program. Open CCLEANER and check ALL the boxes in the INTERNET EXPLORER, WINDOWS EXPLORER, and SYSTEM sections. Then, run the program.
Next, run the FREE Microsoft Clean-up Scan to check for and remove viruses, spyware, and other malicious software.
The scan will clean your computer’s registry files and get rid of a lot of “unwanted stuff” (Microsoft’s phrase) that might be slowing your computer down. It will also check your hard disk for fragmentation, and if needed, prompt you to defragment it.
Did you know that your computer keeps a hidden record of every website you’ve visited on the Internet, and a lot of other information that takes up valuable space on your hard drive? Aarrgh!
You can delete the Internet-related files by opening Internet Explorer and clicking on the TOOLS button.
Then, click on INTERNET OPTIONS. On the GENERAL tab, scroll to BROWSING HISTORY and click on the DELETE button.
Press the buttons to delete any or all of these: temporary Internet files, cookies, history, form data, and passwords. Or, choose the button that allows you to delete everything at once.
TEMP FILES SHOULD BE JUST THAT—TEMPORARY
I strongly recommend that you perform the following simple maintenance at least once a month to easily and safely clean out unnecessary TEMP files and open up space on your hard disk drive.
First, close all open programs.
Open Windows (not Internet!) Explorer. Scroll to and click on MY COMPUTER / LOCAL DISK C. Click on the + sign in front of DOCUMENTS AND SETTINGS. Click on the plus (+) sign in front of (probably) your name, which will be immediately below ALL USERS.
If there’s a TEMP file, click on it, to highlight the word.
Move your cursor over any one of the entries on the right side of your screen to highlight it. Click on EDIT (upper left of your screen) and then click on SELECT ALL.
Click on FILE (to the left of EDIT) and then click on DELETE. You cannot delete the index, so click OK if you are so informed.
Just below the MY DOCUMENTS file there may be a folder titled MY RECENT DOCUMENTS. You can safely remove everything in that folder, and even remove the folder itself. Right-click MY RECENT DOCUMENTS, scroll down to DELETE, and left-click.
While you’re still in the Local Disk (C) directory, scroll down and click on WINDOWS. Scroll down again until you find another TEMP file, which will be near the end of the list as it’s in alphabetical order. Click on the word TEMP to highlight it. Then delete all of the items in the file the same way you did for the other TEMP file.
The computer will refuse to delete certain files, if it thinks they're in use. The errant files will be listed at the top of the files you’re deleting.
No problem. In that instance, use your cursor to highlight all of the files except the one (or ones) the computer won’t delete, and then click on the DELETE button again. You may need to repeat this process several times to delete a maximum number of files.
Don’t worry about files that cannot be deleted. However, you might try right-clicking on the file name (on the right side of your screen), scrolling down and highlighting DELETE, then left-clicking. Or, perhaps they’ll delete at a later time—they usually do.
Don’t be afraid if you should receive a message stating that some programs won’t work if you delete a TEMP file. It isn’t so. Microsoft is crying wolf.
When I first learned about hidden files, I cleaned out over 18,000 items. By doing so, I greatly increased my available disk space!
