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How to Keep your
Computer Clean
by
The F@t Guy
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Navigate:
 Why do I Need These Programs?
The explaination in a 32 oz. Big Gulp... UsingClean and Scan How to use Clean and Scan Clean
and ScanUsing the utilities to maintain your computer and your sanity...
Other related topics:
Organizing
your work by the front-end folders method... Backing upHow to back up all my junk... Turning Cache... into Trash!There is more trash than you think... On Anti-virus and Windows security |
Section News:
Introduction: Hi User! If you are reading this I have recently loaded a big wad of new and confusing programs on your computer and have preached to you incessantly about how important it is to use all that stuff to keep your computer clean and trouble free. Within these pages you will find a simple (yet somehow long-winded) dialog to help you do so. It is not exact, nor is it absolutely necessary to follow it precisely. This has to work for you, not for me. Think of this as a relative guideline and be free to adjust it within reason to fit your particular schedule and needs. Navigating this page: The table of contents is listed in the handy-dandy sidebar so that you can quickly jump to the section you need. Please read this whole thing through at least once to get the big picture. After you become aquainted, you will probably only need the "Clean and Scan" section. Overview: While the real thrust of this article is to teach you how to use the installed anti-spy and anti-virus utilities, you will also notice quite a bit about arranging things on your computer, backing up your data, and other sundry exercises one might consider an entirely different subject matter. I do admit that's true- it does LOOK like an entirely different subject, but keeping things clean encompasses all of these exercises. For instance, if you do not know how to backup, then the tendency will be to have alot more data onboard, and therefore cleaning is a much bigger job. Also, if you don't have some organization, the resulting flotsam and jetsam (junk floating around) can make a great place for critters to be hiding, and can sometimes be the reason for bugs "coming back". Purpose: It isn't my intent to explain every bit of how these programs work, I leave that to their creators. Each of these programs has a website and a help file, and most have a forum where you may ask questions. I will help as much as I can, but it is incumbent upon you, the user, to learn all the variations that may occur . My effort here focuses on getting you up and going, and I want to encourage you to use the other resources that are available as well. How Much, How Often?: One the questions most commonly posed is: "I get the ideas, and I get how to use the programs, but how often should I be doing all this stuff?" As a good rule of thumb, One should backup critical data, empty caches and trash, check for updates on critical programs, and run anti-virus and anti-spyware routines once per week. You may slack a bit if you tend not to get any "hits" with the scanners, perhaps once every couple of weeks. Likewise, If you are getting "lots of hits" with the scanners, then I would suggest you run the scans more often- Maybe every three days or so (and figure out where you are going that is giving you all the bugs) System utilities such as Scandisk (Chkdsk on NT machines) and Defrag should also be done often, too... at least once per month (look for the upcoming how-to: "Windows Utilities -You mean they've been there all along?"). Getting you up to Speed: This page has been posted for my clients, whose machines already have the needed programs on board. If you are not a client and wish to use these programs they are represented in the links below:. We recommend and support the following: For Cleanup: CCleaner general cleanup utility For Antivirus: Frisk F-Protect or AVG (Free or Paid) For Anti-Spy/Ad-ware: Spybot Search & Destroy AND EITHER LavaSoft AdAware OR SuperAntiSpyware For Firewall: Comodo Mozilla Firefox Web Browser Mozilla Thunderbird Email client Also very good: Kaspersky anti-virus (the best there is, but heavy on resources and kinda spendy) Nod32 anti-virus (extremely nice, but complicated and more expensive on mulitple machines) ZoneAlarm Firewall is easy to use and very capable, but is getting rather heavy on resource. |
