Cleaning your PC

[Bryn]

It is indeed, very odd. I have just tried again - and you've guessed it - it is STILL last weeks programme that comes out of my speakers! How can this be??????

Have you cleared your internet cache?

[visualnickmos]

Have you cleared your internet cache?

Many thanks Bryn - I haven't tried that, but (showing total technical ignorance!) I'm not sure exactly how to do it......

[Bryn]

Many thanks Bryn - I haven't tried that, but (showing total technical ignorance!) I'm not sure exactly how to do it......

A free program I would recommend is CCleaner. You can decide just what um, 'detritus' you want it to clean from you computer, including you browsing history. You might want to use its cookie cleaning facility with care though. Many cookies are worth keeping on board. Otherwise, whichever browser you are using should have an option among its tools to clear your browsing history.

It might not be the solution, but it's worth a try.

[visualnickmos]

Thanks again, Bryn.

I followed your advice, pressed a few buttons, and it works

[robk]

A free program I would recommend is CCleaner. You can decide just what um, 'detritus' you want it to clean from you computer, including you browsing history. You might want to use its cookie cleaning facility with care though. Many cookies are worth keeping on board. Otherwise, whichever browser you are using should have an option among its tools to clear your browsing history.

It might not be the solution, but it's worth a try.

I have just downloaded CCleaner from the Piriform site & immediately picked up a virus BlacoleRef.CZ

[gurnemanz]

A free program I would recommend is CCleaner. You can decide just what um, 'detritus' you want it to clean from you computer, including you browsing history. You might want to use its cookie cleaning facility with care though. Many cookies are worth keeping on board. Otherwise, whichever browser you are using should have an option among its tools to clear your browsing history.

It might not be the solution, but it's worth a try.

I've used CCleaner for years. It's good to find a program which you know works and stick with it. I let it have its way with cookies. The number that build up is enormous and most are "detritus" (or c**p as the name of the program suggests). Worthwhile ones will just reload themselves.

[Karafan]

Me too - I apply it just before switching off every night. Its name, for interested souls, is a sanitised version of its original and vastly more descriptive name - Cr*p cleaner!

K.

[amateur51]

Me too - I apply it just before switching off every night. Its name, for interested souls, is a sanitised version of its original and vastly more descriptive name - Cr*p cleaner!

K.

I do the same Karafan - it doesn't usually take long and offers peace of mind

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I've been using CCleaner for over a year now - but, in my innocence, I thought the first "C" was because it cleaned up your C-Drive!

[amateur51]

I've been using CCleaner for over a year now - but, in my innocence, I thought the first "C" was because it cleaned up your C-Drive!

[ahinton]

I've also been using CCleaner for some time now and find it very useful. I use the free version and the only "inconveniences" that come with this seem to be (a) the need to run it manually as it cannot be automatically scheduled to run regularly in accordance with the user's requirements and (b) that updates, although alerted via email, likewise do not install themselves automatically but have to be done manually by the user; much the same applies to Iolo System Mechanic that was recommended to me by Dell, my computer manufacturer, as a management tool (although this does come at a small price but, again, I use the basic non-automated version).

[Dave2002]

I've also been using CCleaner for some time now and find it very useful. I use the free version and the only "inconveniences" that come with this seem to be (a) the need to run it manually as it cannot be automatically scheduled to run regularly in accordance with the user's requirements and (b) that updates, although alerted via email, likewise do not install themselves automatically but have to be done manually by the user; much the same applies to Iolo System Mechanic that was recommended to me by Dell, my computer manufacturer, as a management tool (although this does come at a small price but, again, I use the basic non-automated version).

Re (b) I prefer it if I do any installations manually. OK - you may trust CCleaner, but part of the problem with systems is due to unwanted programs installing themselves, and some have unwanted effects and/or are difficult to remove.

Re (a) - will this help? - http://www.piriform.com/docs/ccleane...ine-parameters Use Command Line operation - CLI. The first part of this link deals with installation, but scroll down and there is information about scheduling runs of the CCleaner program etc., which you seem to want.

[ahinton]

Re (b) I prefer it if I do any installations manually. OK - you may trust CCleaner, but part of the problem with systems is due to unwanted programs installing themselves, and some have unwanted effects and/or are difficult to remove.

Re (a) - will this help? - http://www.piriform.com/docs/ccleane...ine-parameters Use Command Line operation - CLI. The first part of this link deals with installation, but scroll down and there is information about scheduling runs of the CCleaner program etc., which you seem to want.

Point taken on (a) and many thanks for (b) although I'm not that fussed about it really, as it's not as though updates occur several times daily as is the case, for example, with Malwarebytes.

[Gordon]

I'd encourage anyone to use cleaning of their PCS preferably after each session. The amount of crud that accumulates every time you browse and all the temp files that MS apps creates stay around unless you get rid of them. And I don't just mean the Recycle Bin.

Note that deleting a file [ie putting it in the Recycle Bin] does NOT necessarily remove it from the hard drive; the drive directory just takes its name from the list of active files - the data is still in the disc sectors it was recorded in and can therefore be recovered even if it has been "deleted" unless of course those sectors have been overwritten by some new file becase they are now marked as available by the DOS. You need to "shred" these files electronically of you really want them off the machine. I would hope that this is what CCleaner does, not just an erase.

One way to "shred" simply is to make a gibberish file about the same size as the unwanted one, and then save it with the name of the unwanted file which then overwrites the old version. Some shredders do this. This is not totally secure because the machine might decide to write this new file somewhere else on the drive hence the need to make it about the same size and the old one. You really want the new file to go exactly where old one was.

Either use the likes of CCleaner or even use your antiVirus software which has utilities in it [McAfee does as does Norton] to clean up at least some of it. Even Windows Explorer has a feature where you can ret rid of unwanted files - right click on the drive you want to clean then select Properties and then click on the clean up button. This takes a while to assess what there is to remove. You can even select what types of file you want to clean up. If you do all those things you may get close to being squeaky clean, but to be secure you really need to erase and shred old unwanted files.