Something Different:

Oddly enough, I find myself without a worthwhile OE tip to write about this month. Instead of not writing anything at all, I've decided to open up the focus of this column a bit and cover additional issues that might be of interest to you and your computer systems. This doesn't mean that I'll no longer write about Outlook Express. As always, if you have a particular idea in mind for a column, please don't hesitate to contact Linda and she will let me know about it.

So, this month, I'd like to start some discussions about computer system maintenance. There are a number of benefits to following these simple instructions including fewer system crashes and a faster, more responsive computing experience.

The first part of any maintenance program is to clean out the temporary files that Windows creates during its normal operation (these files generally help protect the original files that Windows has opened in order for you to do whatever it is you wanted to do). While Windows is fairly good at mopping up after itself, there are still some things that escape its ability to 'self-clean'. The following paragraphs will show you how to get rid of these left-over files that do nothing but take up space and interfere with normal operation. Keep in mind that these are procedures that should be done somewhat frequently. Personally, I follow them at least once a week to prevent temp files from building up too much.

The first thing I do is to go into my Temp folder (In Win9x/ME, the default location is C:\Windows\Temp. For Win2000/XP, you'll find it normally located at C:\Documents and Settings\*username*\Local Settings\Temp) and delete anything that's more than two days old. The reason I don't delete the newer files is because some of them may still be in use by Windows. When you're finished, you can close Windows Explorer.

Next, open up Internet Explorer and click on Tools/Internet Options. On the General tab (the one that should be selected automatically), locate the Temporary Internet Files section in the middle. Click on the Delete Files button and then the OK button on the second window that pops up. This will clear out the garbage that's been copied to your hard drive from the internet pages you've viewed since the last time you cleaned them out. When you're done, click on the OK button to close the Internet Options property sheet and then close out Internet Explorer.

Finally, right click on the Recycle Bin on your Desktop and select "Empty Recycle Bin" to reclaim all of the space these files had been taking up. If you have Norton's Utilities or SystemWorks program running on your system, right click it again and select "Empty Norton Protected Files" as well (if the option isn't there, don't worry about this step).