Keeping your system up-to-date could save frustration *Ad*

Please bear with this post, it may be long, but for those of you who think computers look after themselves, read on...

Recently there have been a lot of viruses released that could do a lot of damage to both your own computer, those of your friends, colleagues, family and even the internet itself. Most of these are aimed at the Windows operating system itself, and target flaws in its security, especially where it comes to networking, a component used when you are on the internet.

This has made keeping your computer up to date and virus/hacker software free even more vital for the health of your machine, windows operating system, and your general state of mental wellbeing when trying to use your computer.

There are several tools which will help you in this constant battle to keep your computer running smoothly, and without the hair-pulling moments of frustration caused by some unknown piece of software invading on what you want to do.

The first in obviously a decent anti-virus software. There are several very good products out there, but the important thing about all of these is updating it. Don't think that just because you have Norton's that it protects you. It won't. Unless you have the newest virus definitions in the system it doesn't know about the newest viruses. That how things like the MS blaster get through for now. Many have not updated their software.

The second thing is to update windows itself. When Microsoft release software they don't "crash test" it to the extent that we will. This means that when they let software into the world they still have bugs in the system. When these bugs are found they release fixes, or patches, on a website. This site is reached through going to the "Windows Update" link at the top of your start bar (Windows XP users click Start, All Programs, then it is near the top of the next bar). Download everything if you can (ie you have space for it on your hard disk). If you dont have space for everything, at least get the critical updates. Don't forget that if you download one thing, there may be a fix for it (such is internet explorer 6.1 having about 5 fixes) This will not only make it a bit harder for hackers to get easily onto your machine, it will also solve problems that may cause crashes and software incompatability.

The third thing is decent internet controls, such as pop-up-stoppers, ad removers etc. The best adware remover that I have found is "Spybot - search and destroy". To get this useful bit of kit go to www.google.com and type in "spybot search" and it is one of the top links. Go through the website, download the software and install it. This searches for website loggers (software logs where you go on the net and sends it back to ad companies), Keyboard loggers (Log your keystrokes and sends them back, including credit card numbers etc), and advert programs, registry keys and a whole load more rubbish that you don't want, but may not be aware that you have.

I am posting this as LSR's ex husband dropped his laptop off this afternoon after getting the MS blaster. In five hours I found 18 different viruses throughout 163 different files. Updated windows with over 50 different pieces of software and updates, had to reinstall his anti-virus software because the viruses had effectively renered it useless, and when I told him this he just said "I thought I only had the blaster"

Protect yourself. For an hour a fortnight your machine will be much better off for it

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