We has compiled a list of helpful tips that can help optimize your PC, keeping your computer running at an optimal speed, and protecting your hard drive from viruses and spyware.

Before making any adjustments to your computer, you should do a complete backup of your system.

To complete a system backup:
Click Start, point to All Programs, point to Accessories, point to System Tools, and then click Backup.

Once you have completed a system backup, here are some helpful tips to optimize your system (note: these tips are only for Windows 98 or later OS):

1. Check for viruses, spyware, and adware

   Hidden, malicious or annoying programs often load at system start-up, slowing down the system's processing power, or at worst, possibly stealing information from your computer. To remove these types of programs you should scan for viruses and spyware programs on a regular basis.

   ZZ is a FREE spyware scanner that will identify dangerous and unwanted spyware applications on your computer.

2. Clearing up your email

   For most people who use a PC, the email client of choice is Outlook Express. Unfortunately, this is another area of Windows that receives little attention by way of maintenance. Continuously storing old and useless email just serves to bloat directories on your hard drive and causes Outlook Express to take longer to launch and display an email message when you click on New.

   The simplest way to clean up your mail folders is to go into each one and sort by date. The oldest items are the easiest to get rid of as they have usually passed the point of being useful.

   Once you've finished this sort, click on Tools > Options and select the Maintenance tab. Click on Clean Up Now and choose the Compact option to free up any wasted space.

   Once Compact has been completed, you will find that your mail folders open much more quickly in future.

   
3. Internet Explorer

   Now that we've reached the deep cleansing stage of the process, you need to turn your attention to all the files and information that are stored within Internet Explorer. Your browser contains its own selection of files, information and settings, all of which can be purged as you attempt to get your PC back to its optimal performance.

   To do this, open your browser, and click on Tools > Internet Options. Your first task is to sort out how the temporary Internet files on your PC are handled. Click on Settings and check the amount of disk space that's being used. This "cache" can help to speed up browsing, but if hard drive space is at a premium, then reduce the figure to something like 50MB. Click on OK, and then click on Delete Files to clear out your current store of temporary files.

   You're bound to have some useless cookies in the folder too, but clicking on Delete Cookies will remove a substantial number of files, including those that are necessary. Your cookies folder is located at C:\Documents and Settings\USER\Cookies. You can browse the contents of this directory and delete any cookies files you don't need, but the consequences could result in a Web page becoming inaccessible, so be careful.

   The other temporary storage area is your History, which contains links to all the pages you have visited over a certain period of time. If this type of tracking isn't useful to you, then reduce the "days to keep" figure tp a lower number and avoid clutter on your hard drive. Click on Clear History to remove all this information from the History folder along with all the URLs from the Address line drop-down box.

4. Defragment of your hard drive

   The most common and successful method of optimizing your PCs performance, after cleaning your email and browser, is to defragment your hard drive.

   To defragment your hard drive: Select Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Disk Defragmenter, select a drive, and click Defragment.

   

   Why should you run defragmenter on your machine?

   When you defrag your machine, you are making it work better. Defragging puts all of the pieces needed to run your program in close proximity to each other on the hard drive. When you delete programs in your hard drive, you leave empty spaces where pieces of the program were inserted during installation. When you load a new program, the computer goes to the first available slot to place all the parts, so your program could be loading pieces at the beginning, middle and end. This forces your hard drive to hunt all over in accessing all the pieces and putting them together to run your application. By defragging the machine, all the program pieces will be moved and put together so your hard drive can run optimally and access programs as fast as it is capable of doing. In Windows 98, the machine is smart enough to realize which programs you use most often and make them more accessible in the hard drive itself so that they can be accessed even faster.

   Defragging your machine should be part of your regular maintenance — twice a month should keep your machine running at an optimal level. If you load and delete programs often, then defrag more often.

   Before defragging your machine, make sure you close all open Windows programs.