Simple Tips To Keep Your Home Computer Running Optimally
Schedule a time for weekly maintenance tasks.
Clear Your Cache, Cookies, and History
Clearing your cache is important because that is all of the temporary internet files from all of the sites you visit and any downloads you do. These temporary files are stored on your hard drive (cached) for faster access the next time you visit that site. When you visit again, it pulls up the cached page. This is why every once in a while you should refresh the page your on so you will see the page with any new changes the website owner may have done. When you refresh the page a new cached copy of the page replaces the old cached copy for faster access when you visit that webpage site again.
In addition, when you download pictures, videos, music, etc. there is small sippets of script (code) that is used for the actual download process, which are never used again and are stored on your hard drive. These temporary internet files and snippets of download code build up and clutter up your hard drive causing it to run slower. Also, viruses and malware often get piggy backed in via the download and your antivirus program will let it through because you clicked to download the music or the video so that tells your antivirus program that you trust this and allow it by clicking to download. Any virus or malware that piggy backs in, includding malicious key logger, which records everything you type and reports back to the hacker that created and sent it, will not be detected until the next time you run a deep level antivirus scan and by then sometimes depending on the type of virus or malware, could have already done moderate to severe corruption of files, software program(s), the hard drive, and/or the operating system (OS) on your computer.. Clearing these out often keeps your computer running smooth and efficiently.
Cookies need to be cleaned out because there are many viruses and malware that can piggy back on them and infect your computer. Yes, it does mean that after you delete the cookies you will have to log in to sites again that you visit if you have those sights set to keep you logged in. However, it is better to prevent, getting a virus or malware and eliminate it off your hard drive before it is allowed to spread and cause damage to your software programs and/or cause serious damage to your computer, such as fry your hard drive and you have to replace it and load all of your programs on a new hard drive. This takes time and costs you money, especially if you do not know how to do this yourself, then you have to take your computer to a repair shop and pay an IT tech to do this for you. These services plus the cost of a new hard drive are not worth ignoring advice that could have prevented it from getting that far. There are thousands of new viruses and malicious malware created and sent out every month. There are millions in existence. You pay a lot for your computer equipment for your home office, so it makes sense that you should also want to learn how to do all you can to keep your equipment safe from such maladies.
History is important to delete because there are even some viruses that can be written into website code and when you land on that site you get the virus or malware delivered to your hard drive. You may be wondering, if I have an antivirus and on access scan enabled how can this happen. Most of the antivirus programs go through a training mode to learn your surfing habits, etc. and automatically puts sites you frequent or similar sites to those you frequent on the safe site list it compiles. Now, you can go manually into your antivirus program if you know how to without messing up your program (i.e., have some tech knowledge not to change the wrong setting or click on something you are not absolutely sure of what you are doing.) Anyway, when you land on these sites (visit them) your antivirus program deems that to be a safe site because you navigated to it and that allowance from the program allows any code associated with that site that is downloaded to your computer to be safe and ignores it. However, if it is malicious in nature it will usually be caught and quarantined on your next scheduled full (i.e., deep level setting scan).
Before deleting history, if you need to save a website that you are sure you will need to go to again or often then you should click on that site from the history list and bookmark it. Make sure these are well known legitimate sites and you do trust the site. (for example, amazon.com, foxnews.com, msnbc.com, netflix.com, irs.gov, etc. - sites that you know are legitimate business or service sites and you trust). Bookmark the safe sites and when history is deleted you will not lose any of your bookmarked pages during the deletion.
Note: After the following screen shots showing automatic complete deletion, I will tell you about browser add-ons that give you the feature and ability to choose certain cookies to keep for those of us that have important cookies that we need to always keep. However, when you use the add-ons to do this you have to delete the cookies you need to get rid of manually on a set schedule as outlined above (i.e., pick a certain time once a week, or twice a month) where you set aside time to optimize your computer doing some much needed housekeeping and maintenance. So, you cannot use the automatic option of deleting cookies because that will bypass your third party browser add-on that allows you to choose cookies to save.
Below, I will show you step-by-step how to clear cache, cookies, and history. I will give steps for each of the top browsers - FireFox, Chrome, IE, and Safari.
For Firefox Browser:
- Click on Tools Menu, Then Click on Options,
