This guide is in concert with my book, Thoughtful Living, to do as much on your own without having to put out money. I recommend buying nothing unless you have to and if you need help, you seek it on your own and do as much as you can before considering dishing out money. The following is based on Windows XP but much of it will apply to other Windows operating systems.






Throughout the 20+ years of owning computers, they've been both a blessing and a curse. They enable much work to be streamlined but also, there are pitfalls regarding malfunctioning programs and assaults to your computer via the internet by way of unethical persons making and spreading viruses, worms, and other such undesirable malware.

You could spend 20, 30 or more hours trying to fix an infected computer and still not accomplish it but there are many things you can do ahead of time to cut down on maintenance time:

1. Never keep files or folders on the desktop, unless they are shortcuts. The reason for this is that if you have to reload your operating system, the files and folders along with their contents will be deleted as these are actually located in a branch of the windows directory.

2. Have a USB memory stick to back up all your important files. Depending on your computer usage, you should on occasion check the file contents between the PC and USB memory device to update changes. You may also keep a record of some smaller files as attachments that you can send as an email to yourself. A service does exist that will store your files on the internet but it comes with a price and therefore I do not recommend it. Disconnect USB memory sticks whenever not needed while on the internet as these can even be infected by malware.

2a. To help prevent USB memory sticks from being infected by the infamous autorun worm, before even using it you will want to do the following:
In Notepad, type something identifiable to yourself such as "I MADE THIS" and save the file using the "save as" choice and choose "all file types" and name the file autorun.inf. Save this to both your pc hard drive, C:\ as well as to all USB memory sticks.

3. Load as few programs as possible onto your PC. Sure some of you would want to use your PC to as much as possible, however, a smooth running machine will have as few resident memory intensive programs loaded, and whenever you run diagnostic software, the smaller amount of contents on your PC the faster the diagnostic will take. Depending on your circumstance, you may, for example, choose to keep all your media files on one or more USB memory devices and never store on your PC. This also would enable faster diagnostic software run times.

4. If you have favorite places you visit on the internet and do not want to lose the links, you should save the favorites folder located in the Windows directory onto a USB memory device.

5. Keep all your software programs handy on CDs or USB memory sticks if you downloaded them from the internet. This is especially important if you have special drivers for your particular PC hardware and peripherals including the monitor, mouse, and modem.

6. Download free and verifiable good diagnostic software. Never just download programs that claim to be antivirus as there are many unethical antivirus companies that will purposely put a virus on your computer to compel you to buy their product to remove the virus. Whenever there is a question, look up the name of the product on the internet and check for several different sites to ascertain safety.

The few diagnostic software that I use include:
Abexo Free Registry Cleaner Download Abexo Free Registry Cleaner
CCleaner Download CCleaner
HiJack This! Download Hijack This!
Windows Task Manager (and for more skilled users, Microsoft Process Explorer)
Uniblue Registry Booster (Installed only temporarily to diagnose then removed from system)
Malwarebyte's Anti-Malware (imperative that you download updates!) Download Malwarebyte's Anti-Malware

Normal Maintenance:
Delete temporary internet files as often as possible.
Run Abexo Free registry Cleaner. After every time you install a program and your computer functions well, make a backup of the Windows registry using Abexo. In this way, you can always go back to a good versions of your operating system configuration*.
Less often than running Abexo, I suggest running CCleaner to clean up what Abexo doesn't.
Every 6 months to a year or so, I innstall Uniblue Registry Booster and view the results. Do not choose fix else it will prompt you to purchase the program. Keep the results viewed so you can manually go into the Registry program (found in the Windows directory) and edit/delete entries as per the results. If in doubt, don't make any changes to the Windows Registry. Once done, I would uninstall the program. I do not need more memory resident programs running to slow down my PC, and some of these programs have automatic updates that keep running as well and to me that's undesirable. There are also other programs that can be used in this way for free, but make certain they are safe!

When there is suspicion of an infected PC:

1. Run HiJack This! There should be as few entries as possible. You will see some people sharing their HiJack This! scan for public viewing so that an expert may note problems. When I run the scan for my PC, I have only two entries, one to keep my homepage at yahoo.com and the other to keep java running. So, as you see, if you have few entries, you would be able to easily recognize something fishy such as a strange entry in the scan results when running the program so you'd be able to delete the process on your own.

2. Run the Windows Task Manager and note anything strange such as entries you never saw before or if a process uses up lots of memory. With Windows XP systems, there may be a failure with one of the svchost processes causing what's called a memory leak in that it keeps using up more and more memory, causing the computer to be sluggish. Microsoft offers a free patch to fix this problem. If it is not resolved with the fix, it may be caused by an infection for which you will have a hard time finding a way to fix it. Some experts suggest it is caused by Windows Updater to be enabled. You could disable it (right click on My Computer, choose Properties, select Automatic Updates, then click on Turn off Automatic Updates) and cross fingers as it does not always work.

3. Run Malwarebyte's Anti-Malware, making certain you download the updates. Without updating the software, you may waste your time going through a long scan time and it not finding anything wrong. Viruses are constantly being made and thus newer viruses demand newer sets of instructions to spot them.

4. If a problem still persists, check the internet for problems that you are experiencing. You may find the solution. Always check to see through additional searching if any software that is recommended to be downloaded are safe to use. Do not be afraid to post your problem - there are many people who are willing to help. If you are certain that reinstalling the operating system will cure the problem, now would be the time to do so, else give it more time to see if the problem you post on a website can be cleared up.

5. Reinstalling Microsoft Windows operating system:
a. Make any last changes to your USB memory sticks to make certain if you end up losing everything on your hard disk that you will have a copy.
b. Reinstall without formatting the hard drive would be the first choice to make. If this does not cure problems experienced, then reinstall with formatting the hard disk. You may consult other web sites if you are unsure how to proceed with this.

Note, if you saved all your important files and have your additional programs saved on USB memory sticks or know easily where to find them on the internet, jumping right to reinstalling the Windows operating system could be a big time saver. I strongly encourage good record keeping of your files so that this could be an easy choice to make.


* I fail in this regard and I will make an effort to do as I suggest here. It’s easy to fall into a state of laziness and just assume you won’t have any future problems.


Entry 2-28-2011:
I tried for 3 days trying all sorts of ways to stop browser hijacking in both Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. The many ways of fixing according to dozens of websites did not work. If this happens to you and you still need to use the internet before resorting to reinstalling the operating system, once you click on a search engine result, to prevent it from redirecting you to a different site, once you see the correct site shown in the browser, quickly stop it from loading. Then click on the url and then hit Enter.


I tried out the program called HouseCall, a product of Trend Micro, the same company that makes Hijack this! You can download a copy from: HouseCall. It didn’t spot errors on my PC even though there are some problems. Even though it was ineffective, it’s just another tool that may be useful.