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System performance
 | Run Scandisk often to keep your folder and file system maintained. |
| Run Defrag every couple of months or so. If your computer seems to be
slowing down it’s probably time. Don’t run this too often as it really gives
your hard drive a work out. |
| Go to your “WINDOWS/TEMP” directory and empty it every so often. Make sure
your garbage can is dumped too. |
| Want to know how long it has been since you ran scandisk or defrag? Open
My Computer. Right click on your hard drive usually drive C: and click
properties. At the top you will see a tab called “Tools” click it. You will
see how many days it has been since you ran either of them and you can start
them from here. |
| Are your games running slow? Try turning off some of your background
utilities. The area around your clock is called the SYSTRAY. Right click on
each of the icons in the systray and see if you have the option to exit, if so
use it. Don't worry, the next time you start your computer they will be back.
Do not choose disable if that is an option as it will turn off the function
until you re-enable it. |
| Another place to look for Resource eating applications and TSR's
(Terminate and Stay Resident) is the startup folder. |
| Check how much space is left on your hard disk drive. If your drive is
more than 80% full you will start having performance problems. Got to "My
Computer" na dright click on your main drive and click properties. You will
see a pie chart showing how much space is left. |
Shortcuts
| You do not have to type in the whole mess of http://www.------.com. Type
in the name of the site and hold down the Ctrl key and hit the enter key. This
will add the rest for you. This only works for “. com” sites. |
| Try “right” clicking on all your desktop icons that do not have the
shortcut arrow. You will find many of them allow you to adjust program
properties. |
| If you need to change your display properties, Right click on an empty
area of the desktop and a drop down menu will appear. Go down to properties
and click. The display window menu will open. |
E-Mail
| EMAIL, If you file a lot of email messages in folders, compress them
occasionally by selecting the folder you want to compress, then click on the
Compress This Folder menu item in the File menu. Also - empty your trash
(File/Empty Trash Folder). Every unnecessary bit of data contributes to
clutter in your system, and you know what happens when there's too much of
that. |
| If you are not sure who the E-mail is from don't open it. It could be a
virus. |
| To delete more than one E-MAIL, at a time there are two methods. 1) Click
an e-mail and hold down the “SHIFT” key, now scroll down and click another
e-mail. This will highlight all of the e-mails in between the first one and
the last one you selected, then push delete. 2) Click an e-mail and then hold
down the “Ctrl” key. Each successive e-mail you click will remain highlighted.
This allows you to pick out separate files while leaving the ones you want to
keep. This work for file management inside windows also. Then press the delete key. |
| Click an E-mail above a suspect E-mail then hold the shift key and click
an E-mail below the suspect. this will highlight all three. Then hit your
delete key. This will allow you to delete the suspect E-mail without ever
opening it. |
| Remember to dump the trash in your “deleted items” folder in Outlook
Express. If you delete e-mail it will stay in this folder until you do this.
Click on the “Deleted Items” folder then right click you will see a menu that
will allow you to empty the folder. |
Internet
| Check your web directory (the folder you store your web pages in) for
duplicate files. There always seems to be some that are not needed. Delete
them one at a time and make sure it does not change your web page. Some
pictures named differently will look the same but are different sizes, most of
the time they are thumbnails. |
| If a page does not load the first time, hit refresh. Sometimes the server
is busy and does not load it. |
Web
| You can create a disk based web on your hard drive. Open your web folder
and find the index file (index.html or index.htm) "right" click and drag it to
your desktop. Windows will display a menu box, choose "create shortcut(s)
here". The shortcut will appear on your desk top. Right click the icon and
give the shortcut a friendly name. Any changes you make to your web site will
be reflected by this shortcut unless you change the index files name (not
recommended). When you make changes to your web pages, you can go to this
shortcut to preview them before you update your real web page. |
| Learn to use TABLES. They are great for organizing text, pictures and
icons. By the way always insert a line before inserting a table if you are at
the top of the page or inserting a second table. The tables like to get locked
to the top margin or to each other if you do not add an empty line. This is
cumbersome if you need to add something above or between tables. If you did
not do this, highlight the table, Right click and select "cut". Now add your
line and right click and select "paste". |
| Try to keep your pictures down in size. Resize them and convert them to 16
bit color. A good size is 60 to 80 Kilobytes. If you a practice you can get
them even smaller. |
| Remember the majority of people are still using relatively slow dial-up.
Keep those pages small. Try for less than 20 seconds load time for your Main
page. |
| Have you had trouble displaying a web page after you update the hyperlink
to it or you have updated the linked file. Delete the hyperlink completely and
build a new one then it should work (nothing is written in stone with
windows). |
| Hyperlink your favorite web pages inside your own web page. If your
computer quits on you, you will be able to find them easily after it is
working again. |
Cleaning
| Used dryer sheets work great for cleaning your mouse and keyboard. By The
way, Your mouse ball is removable. When your mouse starts to feel rough or
sticking remove the ball and look at the rollers inside. They are probably
covered with a waxy gunk. use a tooth pick to break this gunk loose, then wipe
with the dryer sheet to polish the rest off. |
| Pressurized air cans are invaluable in cleaning your computer equipment.
Make sure you blow out the fan at the rear of your CPU box. This fan is the
cooling fan for your computers power supply. If you can open your case, blow
out all the boards and the CPU fan. The only component you can really harm
with this air can is the CD-ROM or DVD. The laser eye can be damaged with a
direct stream of air so avoid it. Also turn your keyboard upside down and pat
the keys to loosen debris, then blow out the keyboard both upside down and
right side up. |
Windows
| It is occasionally necessary to re-install your operating system
(Windows). If you are using an upgrade, example you had Win98 and you bought a
WinME upgrade, You only have to install the upgrade. When you install only the
upgrade disk, it will ask you to put the Win98 or Win95 disk in to prove you still have
it and then it will continue installing. This does not appear to work with XP
upgrade. |
| Before you re-install an operating system that has mysteriously
disappeared, try using your boot disk and at the DOS prompt type "fdisk/mbr".
This command re-installs the Master Boot Record which can be corrupted and
causes all of the data on your disk to disappear. Also viruses like to delete
the MBR. Caution: use the FDISK command carefully or you will make all your
data really disappear. |
| A useful file for all windows products Win95 and after is
REGCLEAN it can remove registration keys
that are no longer of use. This utility was developed at Microsoft. Create
a folder called Regclean and move the file you downloaded into it. Open the
folder and double click this file. It will open and install. Double click the
cube icon and regclean will run. If regclean gives you an error message then
run the oadist.exe file (usually WinME and after) and it should work after
that. After it runs it will ask if you want to "fix errors". I recommend you
view the readme file before use. |
| In Win ME and XP you have "System Restore" (Start > Programs > Accessories
> System Tools > System Restore). Remember to create restore points every so
often. These restore points can really save you if your system goes toes up.
Also when you use Windows Update it will create restore points you can use to
fix your system. You will not loose any documents, E-mail or files that were
created after the point you restored to. You may have to re-install programs
installed after the date you restored to. |
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