Computer Tip, *A Faster Defrag for Win98*

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A Faster Reboot All PC users know the drill. When you have to reboot your system, you hit the Start button, click Shut Down, click the radio button to Restart, click the Okay button... and wait. Depending on how many programs you have that start up when your computer does, it can take a lot of waiting. A partial reboot may be all you need to do, and it's much faster.

Hold down the Shift key while clicking the Okay button on the shut down dialog screen. Windows will restart without reloading the entire system.

Now if there were only a faster defrag...

A Faster Defrag for Win98 Here's a tip for a faster defrag. I know people that use the Windows ME defrag utility with Windows 98, and they all say it is faster and works fine on Windows 98. For the benefit of new users, you want to defrag your hard drive at least once a month. Over time, your hard drive gets fragmented with files scattered everywhere, and usually not in the most optimum locations. This slows down your computer and can adversely affect the performance and even functionality of some programs.

A few signs of a hard drive that has become too fragmented:

Slowing or sluggish performance. Out of memory messages. Failure to complete tasks. How do you defrag your hard drive?

First, shut down all your programs and turn off your screen saver and any power saver settings. Disconnect from the Internet and turn off your anti-virus program. In Windows 95 and 98, go to:

Start/Programs/Accessories/System Tools and choose Disk Defragmenter.

Choose the drive you want to defragment (usually drive C) and choose OK, follow the instructions. If your disk doesn't need defragmenting it will give you the option to continue or cancel.

Defragmenting, especially on a greatly fragmented drive, can take a good, long while. For this reason, try defragging when you don't need to use your computer, like on your lunch break or before you go to bed. If you use your computer during the defragmentation process it has to keep starting over and can take all day that way, so do it when you can let it work without the interference of having to perform other tasks.

You'll find my original Defragmenting tutorial here:

Go there.

And a tutorial using the Windows ME defragmenter utility here, and link to download it:

Go there.

Troubleshooting

If your defrag utility keeps restarting, you probably have one or more programs still running in the background, or you've been using your computer. If you've been using your computer, stop it! :o)

If you haven't been using your computer: Press the Ctrl + Alt + Del keys at the same time to bring up the Close Program dialog. This will show you what programs are still running. Highlight them one at a time by clicking each one, then click the End Task button to close the program. It may be necessary to do this several times to get it to shut down. You should be able to close everything except Systray (System Tray) and Explorer, leave those two program running.

Once you've closed all programs, you should be able to defrag without any problems. When defrag has completed its task, you'll need to reboot your computer to restart all your programs that run in the background.

Drive Someone Crazy

What would this eBook be without a practical joke you can play on someone? It would be an eBook without a practical joke, silly - but let's have some fun! Would you like to drive a co-worker or family member crazy? Open a program like a card game or the Control Panel. Minimize all other programs and adjust the card game or Control Panel so that it covers about half the desktop. Then hit the Print Screen key on your (or their) keyboard.

Close that program and open up the Windows Paint program (found in Start/Programs/Accessories/Paint). Go to the Edit menu and choose Paste. That will paste the screen shot of the entire desktop into the paint program.

Save it as a bitmap and close Paint. Next, right-click a blank area of the desktop and choose Properties. Click the Background tab and click the Browse button, then find and set the image you made as the background.

The next person using the computer will think there is a card game or the Control panel open, but because it's really a background image that looks just like the desktop, it won't close when they try to close it, and they won't be able to move it or minimize it either. That'll learn 'em to mess with you. :o)

:)

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