1. Software Utilities Pages 65 to 73 Looking After Your Computer Nick Sims

2. Software Utilities Firewalls – Protective barrier around computers connected to a network – User can control what software can pass data in and out of the system

3. Software Utilities – PCs become cluttered with data Cookies Copies of the Web page is retained in the Temporary Internet Folder Save a file – the space on the hard disk begins to fill When some files are deleted this leaves a space which appears as a gap in the map of the disk Some files may not fit in the available gap and therefore the system copes with this by fragmenting the file and storing the fragments (of file) wherever it can – Use Disk Cleanup Scans to correct the problem of fragmented files Cleaning tools

4. Hard Disk Data is stored on small areas on the surface of the disk – which are magnetised – either 0 or 1. The read write head skims very near the surface of the disk. The surface is divided up into small areas (formatting) to make storing and searching easier to do – access time is quicker. Formatting is carried out by a utility program.

5. Hard Disk

6. Software Utilities Drive formatting – Before a disk can be used a disk must be formatted – Physical (low-level) formatting creates cylinders/ tracks and sectors on a hard disk – Logical (high-level) formatting prepares the disk for files by creating the operating system’s file system and management tables The high-level formatting process writes material to allow the operating system to interact with the disk: the boot sector, the root directory table and the FAT table

7. Software Maintenance Upgrade software – Updates i.e. virus protection software Installation of patches – Patches to overcome bugs in the software or to respond to new functionality in the Operating System

8. Software Maintenance Scheduling of maintenance tasks – Remind you when to carry out essential maintenance Utility software aimed at users – Disk Defragmentation, best carried out after a disk cleanup – A system profiler is a performance analysis tool which produces a trace which is a stream of recorded events

9. Disk Defragmenter

10. Software Maintenance Third party utility software – Compression techniques for files i.e. WinZip – Spyware collects personal info about you without you having given consent