Get the best performance out of your PC By Matthew Pinch

Contents Page 1. Virus protection – run an update to the virus definition files 2. Schedule a full system scan for 10:00am every Friday 3. Install a service pack patch 4. Defrag Hard drive 5. Drive Formatting 6. Install and run a firewall 7. Create folders 8. Copy and delete files 9. Back up to CD using compression software 10. Table of software utilities.

Virus Protection Each individual computer should be fitted with a virus protector. This is because no one wants viruses on their machines. The virus protection can protect the computer from all viruses, such as Trojans and worms. You have to keep updating the virus protection software, this is so you can fix bugs and upgrade it to get of newly released viruses. There are a variety of different ways to get around viruses. Some of these being: Firewalls, Virus Scanners, backing up your work, regular virus checks, and updating the virus safety software.

Installation of a Virus Protector To install the virus protector: I Inserted the Disk I then Selected ‘Home Use’ and clicked on ‘Next’ I chose which piece of software I wanted to install Inserted a serial code and selected ‘Next’, then chose Language and clicked on ‘Next’ I clicked ‘Next on the next screen and it started installation, it then displayed me with this screen.

Scheduling a full system scan weekly You can schedule a system scan for certain set times, e.g. weekly. This will scan your PCs software and check for viruses. This should make your PC run generally better and faster because it is constantly checking for viruses week in week out, so if you do have one it will be gone soon. You can set this for a variety of different tasks, e.g. Disk Cleanup.

How I scheduled a task To do this I went into the control panel and selected ‘Schedule a Task’. This then brought up a Screen called ‘Schedule Task Wizard’ which looks like this. I then Selected the program which I wanted to do the scheduled task for, I chose ‘Disk Cleanup’ and selected ‘Next’. It then bought up a screen which asked for a time and a date for how often I wanted to run this task. I chose ‘Friday Night for 8pm on a Weekly basis’. And then pressed ‘Next’ again, which brought me up with a screen showing the details and I pressed ‘Finish’. The scheduled task was now set up to do a disk cleanup every Friday Night at 8pm.

Installing Service Pack Patches This will make the computers performance a lot better because it will have updated versions of the service pack. It will give upgraded versions which will fix bug errors from previous versions. It will also offer new features instead of having to buy a total new version.

Installing Service pack patches For when I did this, I installed a service pack patch for a program called ‘TeamSpeak2’. To do this I went onto their site and selected the ‘Download software patch’ selection which brought me up with this screen. To then install the service pack I selected download on the version I wanted. A screen which said ‘Run’ or ‘Don’t Run’ then appeared on my screen and I selected ‘Run’. It then brought me up with a variety of different steps, each of which I clicked on ‘Next’ and selected the language I wanted to use, which was ‘English’. Finally at the end of the installation it brought me up with a screen which looked like this.

Clean up tools – defragging hard drive This will make the computer run better as it moves all the unwanted files and makes them smaller so they take up less space. This means that your computer has more memory to spare and can run smoother and faster. It is undertaken to improve the performance of the computer and decrease time taken to run activities.

How I did the Defrag For this part of the utility software's, I firstly went into the Control Panel, which can be accessed via the Start Menu. I then selected ‘Performance and Maintenance’ which brought me up with a screen where I chose ‘Disk Defragmentation’. After choosing this it displayed me with a screen which looked like this. After this screen was appeared I selected Analyze which showed me how much space I could clear up, this took about 1 minute. After this was finished I clicked on ‘Defragment’ and it started defragging, which looked like this. This was quite a lengthily process as I hadn’t done it in a while, it took about 2hours in total and at the end displayed me with this screen.

Defrag Continued After the previous screen was displayed I clicked on the button which said ‘View Report’. This then displayed me with a screen which showed what the defrag had actually done.

Drive Formatting Drive formatting is where you can wipe all of the files off the hard drive so it is clean and empty. The main reason for doing this would be to get rid of any viruses or spyware that is on your computer, or just to clean up the files. The benefit of this is it frees up space on your disk drive.

Install and run a Firewall This will protect the computer from obtaining viruses via web browsers or e- mails. It will stop dodgy files which have been infected coming into the computer. It stops computer hackers getting into the system. Windows has an already built in firewall.

Creating Folders You create folders within your desktop so that everything is neat and tidy, and so it is all sorted out. This also makes it easier to find things, as you can name them whatever you want. To do this I went into ‘My Documents’ which can be accessed via the Start Menu. Once in here I right clicked and selected ‘New’ – ‘Folder’. You then select the name you want for the folder, and the folder will be created in the ‘My Documents’ folder.

Copying and Deleting Folders This is a nice and simple way of freeing up space on your computer. You can delete files you don’t want and don’t need anymore, so they are not clogging up the system. You can delete files either singularly or multiply. To do this, click on the file and press the ‘Delete’ button. Alternatively, you can select 2 files, right click, and press delete. To copy and delete folders, it is similar to creating folders. But this time I got the folder I wanted to either copy or delete, and selected it. Once selected I right clicked on the folder, and pressed ‘Copy’ to copy it, or ‘Delete’ to delete the folder.

Back up to Removable Storage This is one of the main ways of protecting data. The main reason for this is so you have the information twice, in case the first copy gets deleted, you have another version. The best devices to use for this are: –CDs –DVDs –External Hard drive –USB sticks

How I created a backup to a storage device. If you want to save information onto a different device, all you have to do is when you go to ‘File – Save’ is go to the ‘My Computer’ option, and select a different drive, for example I used the F: Drive to save, as that is what my USB pen drive was in.

Software Utilities Type Of UtilityPurpose / UseExamples Formatting Drives This is used to clean up the disk drives and delete all the information stored on it. Primarily used to clear space on the disk drive. – This is a powerful example of a formatting drive, because it can destroy all the data on hard and floppy disk drives completely. Defragmentation This clears up space on the hard drive. It moves all files into places so it can save space, it also deletes files which don’t get used to make space. Ultra Defragmenter – This is a defrag tool which can be used for Windows XP + Vista. You can view it via either a GUI, or the command line. SpeeDefrag – This is a program which restarts the computer and runs only the windows defrag program. As it is only running the defrag and nothing else, it will be faster. Install a Service Pack Patch This will keep you up-to-date with the newest software packs. It will make any bug fixes and give you better versions. This makes the program run faster. Microsoft I.E Service Pack 1 – This service pack fixed the bug that didn’t let you complete transactions out on the net. Microsoft Office 97 Service Pack 2 – This corrected errors, such as it gave support for the euro currency, and improved the format converters. Scheduled Tasks If you set a scheduled task for a certain time, it will always run this task at the time. It saves you having to keep doing the task manually, and also means you won’t forget to do the task. TaskPrompt – This schedules tasks at a certain time on certain days, you can add and categorize tasks, and set them for any time period you want. Active Task Manager 1.70 – This is an automated tool set up to run unattended tasks, it can even run the tasks when logged off