Housekeeping!

Look at your computer in the same way you look at your home. 

You like your home to be clean and tidy and everything is where it should be, household running smoothly, everyone has a clean shirt etc.

Keep your home this way takes a bit of regular housework, dusting, vacuuming or sweeping, washing, cleaning and so on.

If you want your PC to run well you will need to do similar tasks.  

• Regular Antivirus scans with up to date software.
• Malware and spyware removal with up to date software
• Disk defragmentation
• Disk cleanup
• Driver updates. 
• Make sure system restore is running

Most of these things can be automated.  Most of these things can be done with free software.  Sometimes you can find software that is both!

One of the most important things is (Here it comes, you've been expecting this one) is a back up!

And yes - I heard the collective groan.  

The times I've heard Will I loose all my pictures? or some version of that. 

Back up of data is imperative.  Disks are not infallible, but unlikely to all go down at the same time.  But you know all of this, you have been told this time and again.

What is also as important is a system image.  Windows can do this without additional software.

You spend ages installing all your software, putting all the serial numbers away in that safe place (I always think of the room of requirement when he hides the Potions book, because "Safe Place" I can never remember exactly where it is!!)

And then Microsoft gets involved and gives you updates, some minor, some major, and that is when it starts becoming a problem.  Minimise the problem by performing the housekeeping.

If you have a system image there is a very good chance that your system can be restored to its former glory with little fuss if a system has a backup.  

I hate it when I have to return a system to a client with just a bare copy of Windows 10 and their data.  Obviously I put AVs and stuff on as well, but it does not look the same as it did and nothing is where they left it.

If you would like some help or recommendations please contact me.  My advice costs nothing, a system rebuild is so much more expensive in many ways.

Have a good weekend all. 

Security Housekeeping - Facebook revisited

When you read a Facebook story that tells you to share this piece of important information with ALL your friends, contacts etc it is often about a scam or hoax or whatever… check your facts before reposting.

Some of this so called information has been doing the rounds since the dawn of the internet!  

Pick a sentence from the post and do a quick google search.  

There are websites dedicated to explaining these myths and internet legends.  Hoax Slayer has a section dedicated to Facebook scams & hoaxes.  Also, if you have time, it makes for hilarious reading. Another one is Snopes.com

Next time someone tells you that Facebook are going to start charging or turn the clock on your iPhone back to 1970 for a retro look or that "famous Person" is moving to your town you can check your facts before reposting to all your Facebook contacts.

Link to Hoax Slayers Current top 5 dumbest

Link to Snopes recent list

Digital Resolutions - Drivers

Before Christmas I started to do a Digital Resolutions series.  I am going back to it.  


Todays topic is Windows Drivers:  

This has come up quite often following Windows 10 upgrades.   I have found that Windows 10 does not always find the optimal drivers for the bits and pieces on your PC.  So it uses and old one that it found on the back of the shelf behind the old zip drive and the floppy drive cable on top of the XP Installation disk, that's a bit dusty.  

It is difficult to persuade Windows 10 itself that actually these “Are not the Drivers you are looking for” and it might be better to tell windows 10 rather than ask it.  

Without going all Jedi Mind trick on Windows 10 you could use a 3rd party application to update your drivers rather than letting Windows do the work.

There are many applications that will tell you that you have outdated drivers but will try to charge you to actually find, download and install the drivers.

Iobit have a suite of "free for home use" applications that includes Driver Booster.

http://www.iobit.com/en/driver-booster.php

It scans your system and locates, downloads and installs updated drivers for each component in your system.  Reboot and you are good to go.



  

Digital Resolutions Security Housekeeping - Antivirus

Part 2 in the Digital Resolutions series.

Have you got an Antivirus running on your system?

If you have:

• does it run on a schedule?
• does it update regularly?
• Is it out of Subscription?

There is no reason not to have a working antivirus installed on your PC.  There is a vast array of options when it comes to Anti-Virus and one of the best free versions is Avast.  It is currently the number one downloaded from Downloads.com.  Avast has a "real-time" scanner,  This means that any file you access on your PC gets scanned at time of opening.  Not all of the free ones do this, but they have other features that maybe Avast does not. Some others have parental controls included and some have a firewall.

Avast Website

Other options include : BT offer within their subscription package, an Anti Virus for free, as do Sky, as do Virgin Media.

A google search for top 10 antivirus or top 10 free antivirus, will give you a raft of options and opinions.

Do make sure it is set up to run on schedule, a quick scan once a week and a full scan once a fortnight.  Ensure that it is able to update automatically, as newer threats will be added frequently.

It does not matter whether you pay for it or whether its a free version make sure it updates regularly and can be set to run on a schedule automatically and that the schedule is set to run when the system is running and not at 3.00am on a Wednesday morning when it is switched off.

Antivirus will only run when the PC is switched on!

Digital Resolutions Security Housekeeping - Facebook Privacy Edition 1

Over the next couple of weeks I am going to be posting some New Year’s resolutions to help with the task of keeping your PC under control, keep it running well and to keep the virus and rubbish off your computers.  

Yes, I know most of the Security software companies are doing something or have done something similar.

So I am going to start off today with one that is quite important to me, but nevertheless a reminder for the time of year.

A while back I felt the need to post on Facebook the following:

When you are posting on Facebook, please give a thought to your own privacy settings.
I take my the privacy of my children seriously and I don’t want pictures of my children posted Publicly on Facebook and I know that many parents feels the same.

My own settings are locked to Friends only, because they are MY friends and I know them off Facebook, in the real world, and I trust them.

There are many tutorials on the Web and within Facebook itself that detail the steps needed to put this basic security in place.

Please respect the privacy of my children and that of ALL children – Don’t post pictures of children without the consent of the parent and make sure the post respects that consent and their privacy.

 It is likely that you will be taking photos over Christmas and New Year.  Think about it before you post them on your timeline.  Who is in the photo?  Ask permission to post pictures of other people’s kids on social media and when you do, make them available to friends only.  It is better to ask permission, than to piss people off!