Computer Maintenace Part 2

Help for Beginners
by Kaye Coller

Computer Maintenance, Part 2

Using Disk Cleanup
In Part 1 I explained how to run ScanDisk. Now we'll go over the next step in hard drive maintanence, Disk Cleanup.

After you've used your computer for a while, you're bound to have a lot of files you don't need. These could be temporary Internet files, downloaded files, or files in the Recycle Bin, for example. Windows includes a utility with versions 98 through XP that does a decent job of getting rid of some of the clutter. Disk Cleanup in Windows XP is a little different than in the other versions, but not a lot. In the other versions

Click on START on the task bar.

Click on Programs, Accessories, System Tool, and then Disk Cleanup

Click the drive you want to clean. The program will tell you how much disk space is available for cleanup.

You will now see a Disk Cleanup window that has 3 tabs at the top. The General tab shows categories of files you may delete. When you click on one, you'll see an explanation below in the gray part of the window.

Click on the View Files button, and you'll see a list of the files in that category. To delete the files, put a check in the box beside the file category.

If you click the More Options tab, you'll be able to delete Windows components you don't need. Click on the Clean Up button for Windows Components. For example, I deleted Paint because I never use it. Then click on Clean Up under Installed Programs. You'll see a list of the programs on your disk. Be careful. If you don't know what a program does, you probably should leave it alone. Click on OK. You'll be asked if you are sure you want to delete files. Most likely you're ready to click Yes

If you have a newer computer, you probably have lots of room on your hard drive. However, it's still a good idea to get rid of what you don't need. You'll be sur-prised how fast your drive can fill up. It's important to keep at least 100 MBs free on your C drive so Windows can use it to function smoothly. Otherwise, you won't be able to burn CDs if you have a burner, or your drive could start getting slower and slower.

If you're using Windows XP, you have one other type of data you may want to remove, the restore points. Don't remove all of them. Keep the most recent. Also, in Win-dows XP, you may get the following message: "You are running out of disk space on [drive]. To free space on this drive by deleting old or unnecessary files, click here." This first turns up when you have only 200 MBs available. If you click on the message, you open Clean Up. If you're really getting low on space, you start get-ting messages more often. It's easy to clean up the clutter, so there's no reason to run out of space.

There are software programs you can buy that do a better job, or at least are easier to use. This type of program works best when it�s installed when the com-puter is new. It needs to keep track of all your pro-grams. However, in combination with the Disk Cleanup utility, you can do a really good job of getting rid of useless files.

Next month's topic will be defragmenting your hard drive - what that means and how to do it. ScanDisk and Clean Up are the steps you should take before you run DeFrag.

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