GUIDE TO PERFORMING REGULAR ROUTINE SYSTEM MAINTENANCEI make no apology if many of you are already familiar with much of what follows, but I thought I should supply some detail in case others less knowledgeable should be reading this and could benefit from the content. Full use is made by me of these procedures and at the end of each computing session I perform those steps outlined under the REGULAR SYSTEM MAINTENANCE section below. I have not had to reinstall XP in 2 years and my system seems to be running as well as ever and with absolute stability.The first thing to bear in mind is that Windows XP is a VERY capable operating system and comes with several excellent built in utilities. For example, it is now quite unnecessary to use 3rd party products for performing routine Error-Checking and Defragmentation of your hard drives. ERROR-CHECKINGDouble click "My Computer". Right Click the hard drive you wish to check and select 'Properties'. Click the 'Tools' tab. Click 'Check Now...' and 'Automatically fix file system errors'. When you click 'Start' you will be asked a question. Respond 'Yes'. Now, shutdown Windows and turn off the power for 20-30 secs before rebooting. The error-checking routines will now run automatically before returning you to Windows.DEFRAGMENTATIONWhat is not generally known is that while XP's defragmentor does an excellent job you do need to run it several times in succession for best optimization. If you have not done this for a while then this is likely to be a somewhat lengthy process. However, once first completed the subsequent runs will be much faster. I suggest you do it 3 times in succession, one immediately after the other.********************A word about NORTON:For many years I was a Norton diehard supporter and, certainly, the suite of utilities proved to be life saving while struggling with earlier versions of Windows, and for that I will always remain grateful. However, I have found that with XP this is no longer necessary and so I made the decision to remove all traces of Norton from my System (I was using Norton SystemWorks 2002). That single act produced an immediate and noticeable improvement in the general responsiveness of my system and as a bonus FS9 seemed to be performing much more smoothly. It is known that a Norton installation is very deeply rooted in the operating system and consequently it is quite hard to remove all references completely. Fortunately Symantec have recognized that this need exists in certain circumstances and have posted detailed instructions to aid the end user:How to manually uninstall Norton SystemWorks from Windows XPhttp://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/nsw.n...=&osv=&osv_lvl=How to uninstall Norton AntiVirus 2003 or earlier by using the Rnav2003.exe removal utilityhttp://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/nav.n...001092114452606Manually uninstalling Norton AntiVirus 2002 from Windows NT-2000-XPhttp://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/nav.n...001083014161306Using the Norton SystemWorks

>REGISTRY>Once you have completed removing what you no longer need, the>time has come to turn your attentions to the System Registry.>As you know, this is vital for correct operations and needs to>be treated with the utmost care and respect to preserve its>integrity. For that reason I would recommend two utilities:>>Registry Healer>www.fixregistry.com/regheal/>>Registry Compactor>http://www.rosecitysoftware.com/registrycompactor/http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/This is a *free* tool which can be used to compact the registry and remove the "slack" space. The way it works it will also defragment the registry hives (the files which actually hold registry data on disk) and since these files can grow large over time, it does make sense to do it every once in a while. Best thing is to run this after a disk defrag to make sure there is enough unfragmented empty space on the system partition.The other tool is also quite useful as it can backup the entire registry.

Hi Alex,Thanks for your valuable contribution. I'm afraid I've been a bit lax and haven't revisited this thread for some time.Inevitably, as time goes by, things change and better solutions appear on the horizon. Your post has prompted me to add the following update:I have stopped using Registry Healer and Registry Compactor. In the case of the latter utility I dropped it when I discovered the latest version was taking forever and a day to back up the registry. Unfortunately, there is no way to skip this part of the program and e-mails to RoseCity Software attracted promises of patches/updates, but none were forthcoming, So, I just gave up on it as I found the time taken for RC to complete its tasks was so frustratingly long.I would encourage everyone reading this to head over to:http://www.tweakguides.com/TGTC.htmland download Koroush Ghazi's excellent Tweaking CompanionYou will find everything you need there, including links to the following 4 utilities, most of which are free.My own routine System Maintenance now includes using 4 utilities to keep my Registry in good order.Used in order (1->4):1. ERUNT2. RegSupreme3. RegCleaner (N.B. will only run on dual core/HT systems if the CPU affinity is set to 1 core - see my other thread "Set Processor Affinity Permanently (Dual Core CPUs)" in the MSFS Tips and Tricks forum for details)4. NTREGOPTI can't recommend these highly enough. They all work quickly and my experience has shown them all to be utterly reliable.Thanks again, AlexRegards,Mike

I have found that a good disk clean program - CCleaner is very good. Cleans out more than the MS one.It can be found at www.filehippo.com and click on CCleaner.Leo

Dave, You are much more cautious than I. I am not a patient man. I use a compressor turned down to 40PSI, and blow the dust bunnies to kingdom come. Of course, I hold the fans with my fingers so they don't overspeed and fry the bearings. Oh, and I do this outside the house cuz there are lots of bunnies in there. I do this to all five of my computers on a regular basis.Very effective and good for 3 months unless you are in a very dusty area. 8^)

I like PC Mechanic from Iolo. Does a good job.

some great programs are:Ccleaner - free utility that will clean registry and cookies and userdata.eusing free registry cleaner - free registry cleaner does great job.then get some anti spyware like adaware personal SE for protection.Id also reguarly go to start->run->msconfig and make sure nothing is running on startup and therefore background on the system you dont need.

HI guysI recommend to use Perfect Disk and Tune Utilities to perform regular maintenance to our PC's. I've been working with this products for about 3 years and they work REALLY GOOD!Roberto