Most people know that keeping viruses out of your computer will go a long way to keep your computer running happy. But there is another side to this some people don't know about which is Malware.
Malware is any program that seeks bad intentions while on your system. It could be a program such as a "key logger" which watches your key strokes and knows when you enter passwords into websites and stores that info later so they can use it and get into your accounts. Or maybe a "adware" that will cause your internet browser to show ads that will slow your browser down.
You might already have a good anti virus program such as Norton or McAfee. I hope that you run those regularly. I personally use a Free antivirus know as Avast which I think is amazing considering that I have never had a virus in over 8 years of using it. If you are not running one I would suggest your get one now because just surfing normal sites can you malware every now and then. If you want I highly suggest Avast which can be gotten by clicking here. It is now on more than 202 million devices. I will let its help page tell you how to use it but it is pretty simple.
Also just letting a antivirus run in the background it not enough. I don't know about others but when you use the scan tool on Avast it also scans for Malware too so it can do it all. I would say run a scan at least once a month. Once you start the scan you can use your computer but it best to let it sit and scan so it can finish faster. I say that because depending on your hard drive a scan could take several hours on my 1.5tera it takes about 4 hours for a through scan.
If you have lots of malware on your computer after running a scan you should see a very noticeable improvement in performance. Thanks once again for reading and I hope you have a great day and my your computer be faster now remember to check the other 2 parts to this if you haven't already and feel free to comment.
Thursday, November 21, 2013
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Maintenance Part 2: Scan disk to Fix Errors
In this part of my series I will look at how to keep your computer running error free and happy with scan disk. This is a very simple process but can take a lot of time depending on how big a hard drive is and if there are any errors. The way I show you does require you to restart your computer and it could be down for a hour or so.
Scan disk is important because if you have errors it hangs your computer up and can even stop programs from running altogether. The scan disk tool that I will show you how to use on Windows scan the disk for errors and tries to fix them. I would say unless you are seeing a lot of errors or having serious hard drive read issues a scan disk might only need to be done every few months.
So lets get into to it From XP on the process is almost identical to what I am fix to say. You can open "My Computer" on XP or just "Computer" on Vista and beyond, from either you start or windows button or from a icon on your desktop if you have it. Next find the hard drive icon that has a little windows logo on it, this is the hard drive your system file are on most computers, and right click it bringing down a drop down box and click properties. This will bring up a small window with some tabs. Find a tab that says tools and click on it. The top tool says error checking on that page and you can click check now. That will bring a window up with 2 check boxes and a status bar. Go ahead and check the bottom box by clicking on it. Then click "Start". It will then bring up a message that it need to be able to access all the disk and will have to schedule a check the next time the computer starts. Click OK and then when you are ready to begin the check just restart your computer and it should do the rest.
This should get your computer's hard drive error free and will help eek out some more speed if you have errors on your drive. The thing I am covering by the way is what your local Guru guys will do to your computer and charge you who knows how much to do these simple things that you can do on your own. As always thank for reading and my next piece I will cover the dreaded virus problem.
Scan disk is important because if you have errors it hangs your computer up and can even stop programs from running altogether. The scan disk tool that I will show you how to use on Windows scan the disk for errors and tries to fix them. I would say unless you are seeing a lot of errors or having serious hard drive read issues a scan disk might only need to be done every few months.
So lets get into to it From XP on the process is almost identical to what I am fix to say. You can open "My Computer" on XP or just "Computer" on Vista and beyond, from either you start or windows button or from a icon on your desktop if you have it. Next find the hard drive icon that has a little windows logo on it, this is the hard drive your system file are on most computers, and right click it bringing down a drop down box and click properties. This will bring up a small window with some tabs. Find a tab that says tools and click on it. The top tool says error checking on that page and you can click check now. That will bring a window up with 2 check boxes and a status bar. Go ahead and check the bottom box by clicking on it. Then click "Start". It will then bring up a message that it need to be able to access all the disk and will have to schedule a check the next time the computer starts. Click OK and then when you are ready to begin the check just restart your computer and it should do the rest.
This should get your computer's hard drive error free and will help eek out some more speed if you have errors on your drive. The thing I am covering by the way is what your local Guru guys will do to your computer and charge you who knows how much to do these simple things that you can do on your own. As always thank for reading and my next piece I will cover the dreaded virus problem.
Monday, November 18, 2013
Maintenance Part 1: DeFrag the Fragmentation
I have decided to start a series of post on Maintenance of a computer. The first segment I will do will be about de-fragmenting a computer. The reason for parts is because I want it to be like most people will have time for. I personally have lots of time to have a computer down 4 or 5 hrs to do maintenance on it but most people will busy lives or laptops that are in use all the time may not have this luxury. You may just have a hour or 2 at the most.
First off why defraging is important. When you use your computer install programs, games, rip music or any thing else that uses hard drive space you run the chance of "fragmenting" a file. A fragment happens when the hard drive put a part of a file on a different place on a hard drive other than right beside the other parts of the file. The reason this happens is because in most cases a Operation System i.e-Windows 7 doesn't know to put a file together it only knows to use the next open place on the hard drive. Defragmenting attempt to put the pieces together so that the hard drive doesn't have to search for all the parts to a file on a hard drive they are just right there thereby decreasing drive search time, which helps speed up a computer.
Option 1: Stock Program: The process of defraging is very simple. I will go over it in for Windows 7 because that is still the most popular OS other than a lot of people still using XP out there but the process is still similar. *First click on your windows button, then find and click on accessories folder in your programs list, next find System tools and click on it and then click on "dfrgui" this is your stock Defrag tool for windows. You will see a button that says defrag now or something to that effect, It does change from time to time so I can't say for sure what it will say for you.
Option 2: FREE Auslogic DeFrag tool: This is the method I use personally I like this tool and it is much more user friendly. It is a small program that you install and it creates a desktop Icon after you run it from the desk top it explains the rest. I like it also because it shows you which files it is moving and how the hard disk is looking before and after. This can be downloaded FREE by going to this website: http://www.auslogics.com/en/software/disk-defrag/download/
NOTES*** Once you start defrag make sure you have time to let it finish if you have to interrupt it, Power goes out or other wise your run the risk of it moving a file that is important to system and if it doesn't move the whole file it will corrupt it and your system may stop working. If you have to stop it hit the stop button and it will stop after the next file is moved. Also allow time for this if you have a older computer and it has never been defraged before it can take an hour or more.
Thanks for reading this and I hope this helps you next will be scanning your hard drive for errors to improve speed.
First off why defraging is important. When you use your computer install programs, games, rip music or any thing else that uses hard drive space you run the chance of "fragmenting" a file. A fragment happens when the hard drive put a part of a file on a different place on a hard drive other than right beside the other parts of the file. The reason this happens is because in most cases a Operation System i.e-Windows 7 doesn't know to put a file together it only knows to use the next open place on the hard drive. Defragmenting attempt to put the pieces together so that the hard drive doesn't have to search for all the parts to a file on a hard drive they are just right there thereby decreasing drive search time, which helps speed up a computer.
Option 1: Stock Program: The process of defraging is very simple. I will go over it in for Windows 7 because that is still the most popular OS other than a lot of people still using XP out there but the process is still similar. *First click on your windows button, then find and click on accessories folder in your programs list, next find System tools and click on it and then click on "dfrgui" this is your stock Defrag tool for windows. You will see a button that says defrag now or something to that effect, It does change from time to time so I can't say for sure what it will say for you.
Option 2: FREE Auslogic DeFrag tool: This is the method I use personally I like this tool and it is much more user friendly. It is a small program that you install and it creates a desktop Icon after you run it from the desk top it explains the rest. I like it also because it shows you which files it is moving and how the hard disk is looking before and after. This can be downloaded FREE by going to this website: http://www.auslogics.com/en/software/disk-defrag/download/
NOTES*** Once you start defrag make sure you have time to let it finish if you have to interrupt it, Power goes out or other wise your run the risk of it moving a file that is important to system and if it doesn't move the whole file it will corrupt it and your system may stop working. If you have to stop it hit the stop button and it will stop after the next file is moved. Also allow time for this if you have a older computer and it has never been defraged before it can take an hour or more.
Thanks for reading this and I hope this helps you next will be scanning your hard drive for errors to improve speed.
Sunday, November 17, 2013
Pick the right SD card for your tablet
SD cards are almost needed now especially if you buy a lower priced tablet. Some of the higher priced one come with one but if you have to buy one it can be hard to decided what you will need. Some higher tablets come with plenty of space but your sub 150 tablets usually aren't going to have one with them. Some people want to know that they should get with their tablet. Do you need a 4, 8 maybe even 32 or 64gb card? Is this one better than this one? Well in this little piece I will cover that.
1st off it depends on what the tablet will be used for. You will kind of need to know the person. If you know they like a few apps and they will mostly be using to browse the web on the go something small like a 2 or 4GB(gigabyte) card should do fine for them. If they like lots of apps and will be downloading like a mad man then you will need more. I they will load tons of music on it or have videos or be downloading lots of books. I would suggest at least a 16gb and would prefer a 32 that way they never run out. Most Android tablets now can go up to 64GB cards but in most cases unless it had a back camera and they will be recording a lot of HD video and taking lots of pictures on top of everything else a 64GB is just a bit over kill and you can save your money because they can be pretty pricey.
2nd would be how much should I spend on a SD card and I hate to say it but its going like that old saying now a days "you get what you pay for" in most cases. Now most of the time you can get away with buying a cheap Micro SD card but quality control can be a issue some times. Micro SD cards are getting pretty affordable so I would say spend the extra few bucks to get a name brand like San Disk, Kingston, or Sony. The reason i say this is because of data stress. Like all the things the more you use it the weaker it gets. There is a difference in using a card in a Camera vs a Tablet. While you might get a way using it in a camera that only access one part of the card a time a tablet access multiple files at one time putting it under stress. So you want something that doesn't mind being assessed a lot. Apps can access many files at one time and if a card isn't ready to handle that it might start to throw errors or get missing files and there is nothing worse than have that brand new tablet have problems because of something not even a half inch long.
I hope this helps with getting your accessories in order for Christmas thanks for reading and I hope that love it
1st off it depends on what the tablet will be used for. You will kind of need to know the person. If you know they like a few apps and they will mostly be using to browse the web on the go something small like a 2 or 4GB(gigabyte) card should do fine for them. If they like lots of apps and will be downloading like a mad man then you will need more. I they will load tons of music on it or have videos or be downloading lots of books. I would suggest at least a 16gb and would prefer a 32 that way they never run out. Most Android tablets now can go up to 64GB cards but in most cases unless it had a back camera and they will be recording a lot of HD video and taking lots of pictures on top of everything else a 64GB is just a bit over kill and you can save your money because they can be pretty pricey.
2nd would be how much should I spend on a SD card and I hate to say it but its going like that old saying now a days "you get what you pay for" in most cases. Now most of the time you can get away with buying a cheap Micro SD card but quality control can be a issue some times. Micro SD cards are getting pretty affordable so I would say spend the extra few bucks to get a name brand like San Disk, Kingston, or Sony. The reason i say this is because of data stress. Like all the things the more you use it the weaker it gets. There is a difference in using a card in a Camera vs a Tablet. While you might get a way using it in a camera that only access one part of the card a time a tablet access multiple files at one time putting it under stress. So you want something that doesn't mind being assessed a lot. Apps can access many files at one time and if a card isn't ready to handle that it might start to throw errors or get missing files and there is nothing worse than have that brand new tablet have problems because of something not even a half inch long.
I hope this helps with getting your accessories in order for Christmas thanks for reading and I hope that love it
Saturday, November 9, 2013
First post wohoo
Hello all my first post on this new journey. I hope to bring the work of technology closer to you. Do you have questions. I just might have your answers. I am Jarritt Cumba. I have many years of working on and with computers and tech devices ranging from a little networking card to big mainframe servers and everything between. I hope to share some of that knowledge with you. I hope to cover everything from troubleshooting a computer to helping you decide on what to get and what you need not what some one tells you you need. Thanks for reading this and go ahead and bookmark because good stuff is coming your way.
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