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A Top 10 List That Can Save Your laptop

Many who read this article may find these recommendations to be old news. However, think about the number of family, and friends that ask you for help fixing their computer and this may give them a bit of help

This list of recommendations for a healthy & secure computer is by no means a complete list of all you can and should do. It is however a good start if you want to keep your computer running good for an acceptable period of time. It will also help prevent some of the most common issues related to PC security.

1. Virus & Spyware :

The big one; make sure you have installed some sort of anti-virus and spyware protection. Don?t assume that the default configuration of the program is the best suited for your pc. For instance, I can?t tell you how many people I know whose computer has got a serious virus because of just one small but very important task. When the anti-virus software pops up a message and tells you that your subscription is about to expire, don?t just hit the ignore button. Take a ten minute break from what you are doing and renew your virus signature subscription. Not only will this keep you updated on newer viruses, it will allow your software package to update to newer versions. The same thing goes for spyware protection. There are plenty of free spyware protection solutions out there, none are perfect, but most do the job.

2. Hard Drive Fragmentation:

Believe it or not, many people have never even heard of this, or the process of Defragmentation. In a nutshell, when you install software or create files and data, the Operating System keeps this data on your hard disk drive. The most efficient way of storing this data would be in one continuous disk file. However, files are not always stored this way, or are initially stored this way and later become split up, or fragmented. Because of this, when the data or file is retrieved, the hard drive must be searched in multiple places just to combine data that makes up one file. This slows things down tremendously. If you are running Windows XP or Windows VISTA, you should perform a disk defrag at least fortnightly, more if possible.

3. Installing Games & Disk Intensive Software:

If you’re a gamer, or regularly use disk intensive software, the above Defragmentation process will help. However, you can also take another step to make things move a little faster. If you have two physically separate disk drives in your system, I suggest that you use one primarily for the Operating System and related software, and devote the other physical disk for installing games and other disk intensive applications. This cuts down on the competition for disk resources between your Operating System and other applications. Other things you could do as well, such as configuring the appropriate type of RAID where multiple disks appear to the operating system as one big logical disk drive.

4. Software & Hardware Firewall Protection:

If you are not using a firewall, then you are crazy. Actually, there is a significant chance that your system is already compromised if you have no firewall protection at all. Many cable/DSL router combo devices have built in firewall protection, and this is at least a good start. However, if you have Windows XP SP2, go ahead and enable the built in firewall as it will provide you another level of protection. Oh, yes, and when the system pops up a message about whether or not to allow a certain application or communication to take place, don?t just hit the ok button, read it through before making a decision.

5. Updating Drivers:

Hardware manufacturers routinely update their drivers. This includes video cards, sounds cards, capture cards, system boards, you name it. Some manufacturers have started to release automatic updates for their hardware, but many have not. Make sure you check these sites regularly and when a driver update is available, install it promptly.

6. What Do Your Children Download:

This is another big one. I can? tell you how many times I have been told by people that they have no idea how something got installed on their computer. Usually their second sentence contains ?one of my children must have downloaded it?. The first thing that comes to mind is ?why do parents let kids download what ever they like in the first place?. Not only can this severely impact the security and performance of your computer, who knows what your kids are getting their hands on. Do you know what one of the most frequently installed application installs I see on a teenagers machine is? Kazaa, BearShare, eDonkey are P2P file sharing programs. I don?t care what anyone says regarding how convenient and safe these applications are now, they are wrong. Monitor what your children are doing / downloading on the Internet. Install a parental control software package if need be.

7. Rebuilding Your Operating System:

If you are not familiar with system imaging software, I suggest you read up on them. One of the most popular packages is ?ghost? and it?s been around for quite some time.Rebuild systems on an annual basis using a imaging package to create a complete image of the basic OS and application install. This allows you to not only re-install the base operating system and applications by hitting just one button, but can save you big time in the event of a system disaster.

8. Installing & Uninstalling Applications:

Just about every time you install a new application or piece of software you increase the time it takes to boot your PC and in some cases decrease its performance. One thing that drives me nuts is printing software.It seems they load all kinds of unnecessary real-time running applets. HP printers are notorious for this. Be very aware of what it is you are loading and only load those components that you need. Even some off-the-shelf software packages load adware and other not so helpful applets. Also, when you uninstall software, not all the software gets uninstalled in many cases. One thing I suggest is to purchase a registry cleaner. This can dramatically decrease boot times and in many cases increase the overall performance of your PC.

9.Purchasing & Downloading Items from the Internet:

When you download or purchase any software from the Internet, make sure you pay close attention to everything you are agreeing to or checking off on the various pages that lead up to the final purchase or download. As with everything else, make sure you read the fine print. You may be agreeing to download and install something you don?t need or may impact the security and performance of you PC. Also, how many more mailing lists do you really need to be on? How many Internet Explorer tool bars do you need? Most of these tool bars should be renamed to ?adware / spyware bars?

10. Installing Operating System & Application Patches

In a nutshell, if you are using Windows XP, make sure that automatic updates are turned on. This is very important. Microsoft releases security and bug fixes routinely and some of them are critical in nature. Something people tend to overlook is updating and patching their applications. For instance, Microsoft Office has critical security patches and performance enhancements available in the form of patches and service packs. It?s not just Operating System bugs that can put you at risk, applications can too.

These few tips are very basic to the more technological people ,but for the majority of users without computer knowledge these may act as computer saving tips.

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With the economy in a downturn, businesses are thinking twice about travel expenses, especially for meetings and presentations. As a substitute, many are turning online to Web conferencing. While relatively less expensive than most trips, these services are still costly. San Jose, Calif.-based RHUB (Real-Time Collaboration HUB) Communications is perfectly positioned to take advantage of the situation with its line of Web conference appliances.

We’ve had the low-end model TM-200 installed in the Test Center for a few days and are very impressed with the ease of installation and quality of performance it brings to the table.

At 9 x 6 x 1.4 inches and weighing 2.4 pounds, the TM-200 is slightly larger than a SOHO router and is nearly effortless to install. A small grey box with five status LEDs in the front, the back has only an RJ-45 Ethernet connection, the AC adapter jack and a nine-pin serial connector. There is also a pin-hole reset button. Connection consists of running a network cable between the LAN and the device and plugging in the power adapter. The serial connector is for a console cable reserved for support uses.

Once installed, all we had to do was log on to the device from a Web browser on the network and finish the configuration. Although the management console is very intuitive, the administrator manual does a good job of explaining, with illustrations, the three types of deployment: Outside the Firewall; Inside the Firewall and accessible by users outside of it; and Inside the Firewall and not accessible from outside of it. We chose the second, which offers the most usability.

While not necessary, reviewers set up a free, hosted DNS with DynDNS.com and followed the directions embedded in the configuration screen of the console. After that, we created user accounts, forwarded the necessary ports on our router (also explained simply in the administrator guide) and did a quick read of the user manual to see what the appliance is capable of.

Within minutes, we had a meeting up and running with attendees being able to see everything on the host’s computer screen that they wanted us to see.

In this type of meeting, called an interactive meeting, it is just as easy for the host to turn over control of his or her PC, or turn over hosting duties to another person in the meeting.

Another meeting type is a seminar, where the host can’t turn over control. One big difference between RHUB’s implementation and its competitors’ is that users only have to download and install a client on the TM-200 if they are hosting. Attendees can use any Web browser, on any operating system.

Besides interactive meetings and seminars, the meeting can also be configured as remote control, which allows the host to take over control of the attendee’s computer as soon as they join the meeting, and remote access, which allows the host’s computer to be controlled unattended. Respectively, these meeting types are great for support technicians and accessing a work computer from home or the road. In testing, they all worked without incident.

All meeting types give the host the option of creating a password that attendees need to enter and can be scheduled in advance or started impromptu. Pre-populated e-mail invitations can be sent out to attendees with a URL and access code if desired. Additionally, all RHUB appliances include audio conference call service at no extra cost. Although it is not a toll-free number, this is a nice feature that makes the appliance a complete, one-time purchase product.

Including the $995 TM-200 model, RHUB currently offers four different models of the appliance, the larger two of which are 1U rack-mount chassis. The most basic TM-200 has a default capacity of two meeting rooms and ten concurrent users between them, and can be upgraded to a maximum of four rooms and 20 users. The largest of the devices starts with 50 meeting rooms and 200 concurrent users, expandable to 200 rooms and 2,000 users.

RHUB estimates that the products pay for themselves in three to five months compared to subscription-based competitors, and after some quick Web shopping, we would tend to believe it. The extremely easy installation and almost flawless operation make it a no-brainer for any company needing the services it provides.

Note: This article comes from ChannelWeb, 2/6/09