PC Cleaner Guide: 6 steps to a clean and fast PC.

As you use your PC and install programs, it gets slower and cluttered. When this happens, many of us start thinking of buying a new PC, when the real answer is to learn how to clean the garbage.

This article will teach you how to clean it and make it like new!

The steps to get a cleaner PC are:

1 - Kill malware
2 - Get a good antivirus
3 - Uninstall unwanted applications
4 - Reclaim hard disk space
5 - Clean the registry
6 - Clean your desktop

STEP 1: KILL MALWARE

Malware: software you didn't ask for that damages your PC and steals your information

What is malware?, from wikipedia: "Software is considered malware based on the perceived intent of the creator rather than any particular features. Malware includes computer viruses, worms, trojan horses, most rootkits, spyware, dishonest adware, crimeware and other malicious and unwanted software".

In short, we are talking about software you didn't ask for and what might be doing different types or damage, or stealing your information.

The first thing you want to clean from your computer is malware. There's a free and tested program that you can use:

Download it here

STEP 2: GET A GOOD ANTIVIRUS

If you want a clean PC, you must have a good program that stops any viruses or malware that wants to enter your PC

A computer virus is a computer program that can copy itself and infect a computer without the permission or knowledge of the owner. Today the kind of known viruses grows by the hundred each week. As you browse the internet you are facing big risks.

AVG is a free antivirus used by 80 million users,

Download it here

STEP 3: UNINSTALL UNWANTED APPLICATIONS

We have lots of applications we don't use!

If you own a DELL or HP or TOSHIBA or LENOVO, or any brand of computer, chances are you have a lot of useless applications installed.

Having crap software installed is bad, because:
- it clutters your desktop and start menu
- it takes hard disk space
- most of those applications start with windows, so they are taking valuable RAM memory space.

You can uninstall most applications yourself, to do this, use the 'Add/Remove Programs' option (in Control Panel).

Here's a video in about.com that can help you

Some applications are difficult to remove, for those cases, you may want to look the undisputed leader, REVO uninstaller, it's FREE.

Get REVO

STEP 4: RECLAIM HARD DISK SPACE

Do you know what is wasting your hard disk space?

You have a Hard Drive, maybe it's big, mine for example is about 200 GB. Do you know how it's been used?

There's a very good, free application available, that lets you know, in a graphical way, how your disk is used. This way, you can see what files or folders are good candidates to be transfered to an external disk, or just deleted.

WinDirStat:

Get WinDirStat

STEP 5: CLEAN THE REGISTRY

The registry is a big database where all applications store information.

As you use your PC, the registry starts to get dirty and your PC starts getting slower.

My choice for registry cleaning is a free program that cleans not only the registry, but also unused files, and helps you ensure your privacy.

CCleaner, it stands for crap cleaner. 275 million downloads!.

Get CCleaner here

STEP 6: CLEAN YOUR DESKTOP

If your desktop is full of icons and folder, clean it!

As we use our computers, we start putting files on the desktop. Sometimes we drop images there, and save our documents or spreadsheets and everything we download. Our desktop starts getting cluttered, and most of use don't like it that way.

There's a program that can help you, PC Desktop Cleaner cleans your desktop, storing your files in a special folder. It creates an index so you can quickly and easily find any file.

Get PC Desktop Cleaner