Periodically, you should cleanup the hard drive on your computer. Over time temporary files will become bloated and take unnecessary space on your hard drive. Windows has a program called Disk Cleanup, which can be found in Start -> Accessories -> System Tools. If your running Windows Vista or 7, you can click on the Windows logo (bottom left) and type in “cleanup” in the search box.

After you start Disk Cleanup, you will need to select the hard drive that you would like to run it on. This is usually the C drive but if you have more than one drive, you should select the drive that Windows is installed on. After selecting the correct drive, it might take some time for it to detect everything that can be cleaned, so be patient.

When running Disk Cleanup, there are several options and will vary depending on what version of Windows you have and the programs you have installed. On Windows XP, there’s:

• Downloaded Program Files
• Temporary Internet Files
• Offline Webpages
• Microsoft Error Reporting Temporary Files
• Recycle Bin
• Temporary Files
• Compress Old Files

This is what it looks like:

I like to check all except Compress Old Files. If you don’t know what something is on this list, you can highlight it and it will give you a brief description below or you could  search for it on the internet to see if it’s not something you would like to save.

When you have selected everything that you would like to cleanup, click the “OK” button.

After it’s done, you might want to run Disk Defragmenter. I have directions for running Disk Defragmenter in another blog post.

The operating system needs the correct drivers to use the hardware (video card, sound card, network card, etc.) in your computer to properly recognize them. Having the latest drivers installed means that you have the most optimized drivers which could enhance the performance of your computer.

People often reinstall Windows to get rid of all the junk that accumulates on their computer or to get rid of a nasty virus. The Windows installation disc often doesn’t have the correct drivers for some of your hardware, like your video card, and will use a generic driver. Generally, it will set your resolution low so it will at least display something on your monitor for initial setup. Updating the drivers of your video card will greatly enhance your computer’s visual appearance (when updating from the generic driver). Hardware manufacturers periodically update their drivers to add new features and/or optimize performance.

The easiest way to get the latest drivers for your computer is windows update. Not the automatic update that you know is running because you always see the update notification. You should manually update Windows and choose “custom” update (XP). There will be optional updates which will include drivers for your hardware. For Windows Vista and Windows 7, you can click on Windows update and click the “other updates” link.

Another way to update your drivers is to visit the manufacturers website. This is for the more advanced user because you will need to know the make and model of the specific hardware your trying to update. We have links to the most common manufacturers websites on our links page.

With the cost of hard drives as low as they are right now, you can easily afford to buy an internal or external hard drive to safely backup all important information from your computer.  An internal hard drive is located in your computer and if you have a desktop, you more than likely can add another one right next to your current hard drive for a great place to copy everything important. So if the main hard drive fails or you can’t get into your operating system (OS), you can rest assured that your data is always safe on the second hard drive (as recent as your last backup).

An external drive is a nifty thing to have around. There are 3 general types of external hard drives on the market: USB, Firewire, and network. The most common is the USB external hard drive which can be plugged into your computers USB port. They work just like a USB pen drive but have a much greater capacity limit. When you plug an external hard drive into your computer, Windows will install it and it will assign a drive letter to it. You can then access it from “My Computer”. The great thing is mobility. For example, you could copy all you photos from one computer, put them on the external drive, then copy them to another computer. I like to use an external drive to copy customer’s files that they want to save from their computer before reinstalling their OS. When done, I copy all the files back to their computer.

The Actual Backing Up Process

There’s a ton of software companies out there that can backup your data in a few easy steps and some people love them. I, on the other hand, don’t like having to deal with another software package installed on my computer. I like good old copy and paste partly because I know where all my data is scattered around the hard drive and I like being able to view my external hard drive files rather than seeing one big compressed file that alot of the backup software companies like to create. Most backup software programs like to copy all the files you selected for backup and compress them into one big file that is pretty much useless unless you open the compressed file with the same program that you created it with. If you decide to purchase a backup program, I would definately check the output formats.

Before external hard drives, I used a program called “Nero” which would allow you to backup files to multiple CDs or DVDs. It’s a relativly simple program and the output is the same as copy and pasting files.

Safe Than Sorry

I’ve talked to several people who have had their hard drive crash (hardware failure) and had to ship their hard drive off to a recovery company because they didn’t have any backups of their data. The services cost thousands of dollars and they can’t guarantee to recover all the data, if any. This raises the question, “How much is your data worth?”.

If you have any questions or want me to explain further, feel free to submit a comment.

Simply open CCleaner, and the cleaner section should be open.
Click run cleaner and wait. Thats it, your done.
It is a very safe tool and has never damaged any of the hundreds of computers I have run it on.

Remove invalid registry entries
Next up is the registry. Frankly, the registry is overrated as a speed tweak, in general, but it does get large and can contain many invalid references. The registry is not an area for even the average computer user to be playing around in. The good news is CCleaner has a safe registry cleaner built in, so why not clean out old, invalid entries?

Click the issues button.
Click scan for issues.
Click fix selected issues.

Thats it, your done, a safe, fast registry clean.

Startup items
Here is a HUGE culprit on the average PC. See all those icons in the lower right corner of your screen? Those are all being loaded on startup, and those are not all of them either! If your wondering why you have to wait a minute to use your computer after startup, it is because all of those items are loading after Windows has started. They also use up memory just sitting there. Removal takes a bit more knowledge, or research, then the previous two, but you can do it!

First off, if you know what these items in the tray are and do not need them running, you can either right click an icon and look for options or a “run with Windows” option. Otherwise, you can double click any icon to open the program and look for options from there. Some are easy and common. Quicktime, AOL and RealPlayer are good examples of items that do not need to be there.

CCleaner also has a startup manager. Click tools, then startup. You can delete any unneeded items from there. Be careful, there is no backup, so either look up the program on Google or ask on forums if you want to know what an item is for. Because the startup loads drivers and some programs you may need, be careful removing items you are unsure of.

Defragment your hard drive
Now that you have removed all of this garbage, you have defragmented files all over your hard drive. Reading and writing data on a heavily fragmented hard drive is slowed down because the time for the heads to move between fragments on the disk surface can be substantial. The files on your hard drive now probably look like a box of tacks after I open them and toss them on the ground. Defragmenting your hard drive would be like the box of tacks still sealed. All neat and tidy and easy to get at.

In Windows XP:
Click Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> Disk Defragmenter

In Windows Vista:
Click the Windows Button and type in “Defrag”. The Disk Defragmenter link will show up and when it does, click it

When you have Disk Defragmenter up and running select you hard drive (usually C:) and click “Defragment”

“I have a dirty secret. I’ve never cleaned my computer. Sure, I’ve dusted my monitor, but I haven’t taken off the cover or tried to reach the crumbs lurking inside my keyboard.”

Dust clogs the vents behind your computer, which causes your CPU to heat up—and heat is the biggest cause of component failure in computers. Regular cleaning could save you costly maintenance fees down the road.

Step 3: Keyboard

Turn the keyboard upside down and gently shake it. Most of the crumbs and dust will fall out. Take a can of compressed air and blow into and around the keys. Next, take a cotton swab and dip it in rubbing alcohol. It should be damp, but not wet. Run the cotton swab around the outside of the keys. Rub the tops of the keys. If you have a laptop, follow the same procedure but take extra care with your machine. Do this monthly.