Do-It-Yourself (DIY) Step-by-Step
Guide to Get Your PC Running Again!
I recommend erasing everything if your computer won’t boot up or is super slow due to a virus, spyware, or adware. To install a fresh copy of Windows you should turn the computer on then place the Windows installation CD into the CD/DVD rom drive and close it. Restart the computer with the disk in the drive. If it asks you to ‘press any key’ to boot from the CD/DVD in the drive then press any key on the keyboard to boot off the CD. If the ‘press any key’ to boot from the CD/DVD option doesn’t appear when you restart then you may have to press a specific key such as F12 etc. to reach the boot device selection menu . There you should select CD/DVD to continue. If you still cannot get the ‘press any key’ to boot from the CD/DVD option then you may need to change the 1st boot device to CD/DVD drive in the BIOS. You can usually get to the bios by pressing a specific key such as F2, Delete, etc. on computer immediately after you turn it on.
If while installing windows you get a blue screen of death then there is a pretty good chance that either your hard drive is bad or your ram is bad.
Once you have windows installed, chances are that things such as sound and display will not be working properly. Typically though, the networking card will work. You should connect the computer to the internet then go to the control panel and run windows update, reboot when it asks, then repeat this same over and over until the message eventually says there are no more windows updates. If your networking card does not work or if the display still doesn’t work properly then you will have to download the drivers manually directly from the manufacturer.
Once all the devices on your computer are working correctly, then you can soon begin to install all the programs, but before we start putting new programs on your computer you should remove anything that is not needed, such as ad based toolbars, smiley programs, chat software, ad based video players, AOL, etc. Anything that your computer doesn’t need to run shouldn’t be on there. The items installed on your computer are listed under the control panel, either in ‘Add/Remove programs’ or ‘Programs and Features.’ Don’t remove everything though, just the non-essential programs.
There are a few tweaks that can be done to save memory and to speed up windows. First you should personalize the appearance of your windows desktop using the control panel . Go to personalize or display, pick the ‘Windows Classic’ theme, select no screen saver under the display, select solid black for the background color. Go to sounds, pick sounds tab, select none, and no startup sound. Go to the mouse options, drag the pointer speed to fast, select automatically move pointer to dialog box, and select no scheme for the pointer, and no pointer shadow. Go to system, advanced system settings, advanced, performance, settings, and select adjust for best performance. If you have windows vista or 7 then go to user accounts, turn user control off, create a password if you don’t already have one. Go to security settings and turn notifications off then hide all notifications. System restore can also be disabled but I suggest you use the least amount of space possible for system restore, from 200MB to 1.25GB. If you plan on having lots of MP3s then open windows media player, under tools-options deselect retrieve additional information from internet on the library tab, deselect retrieve media information, deselect update music files, deselect download usage rights, and deselect automatically check using the net under the privacy options. Right click the desktop, select small or classic icons, select auto-arrange icons, right click the toolbar at the bottom of the desktop, select toolbars, select windows media player. Go to power options, select balanced, change advanced, turn off the display plugged in 1 hour (battery 15 mins), dim 15 mins (battery 10), turn of hard disks 10 mins (battery 5 mins), computer to sleep 300 mins (battery 10 mins), processor min 0% max 100%, wireless max performance both battery and plugged in, no password on wakeup, sleep never, close lid & power button shut down, sleep button does nothing. Save changes and restart the computer by using the shut down button then selecting restart and waiting for it to reboot. Fun! Fun!
Run and install all of Windows Updates over and over and reboot until it says no updates are available. (if you are possibly using a pirated version of windows or just don't know then do not install update #1033, I don't even install this at work because sometimes it screws up the license even though you paid for it and Microsoft will not send you a new license for free even if somebody else has stolen yours)
Now to the hard part, installing all the programs.
1. CCleaner - Optimization and Cleaning FREE
(check all the boxes under system and programs, hit clean, run registry cleaner too)
http://www.filehippo.com/download_ccleaner
2. Spybot - Search & Destroy FREE
(update, immunize, then check for problems)
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html
3. AVG Anti-Virus FREE
(run if you have a virus, stays open all the time, has real-time protection)
http://free.avg.com/us-en/download?prd=afg#tba2
4. Avast Anti-Virus FREE
(run if you have a virus, stays open all the time, has real-time protection)
https://www.avast.com/en-au/index
OTHERS ALL FREE!!!
http://www.7-zip.org/
(to open any compressed files or create your own compressed files)
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/
(to have Firefox if you want it)
http://www.google.com/chrome/eula.html?standalone=1
(to have Chrome because IE is creepy slow)
http://java.com/en/download/manual.jsp
(everybody needs JAVA)
http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/alternates/
(everybody needs Shockwave)
http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/
(don't use it, just install it to get the iPod drivers if made a mistake and bought one by accident)
http://www.mediamonkey.com/download/
(is much better than iTunes, just right click a song and select send-to iPod)
http://www.codecguide.com/download_k-lite_codec_pack_mega.htm
(codecs to play any video, select full install {with media player classic}, check mark all file types)
http://www.codecguide.com/klcp_64bit.htm
(64 bit codecs for 64 bit computers only)
http://www.audiograbber.org/
(to save your CDs off to MP3s faster and better than slow error filled windows media player)
(click compress to mp3, select maximum quality mp3 128 bit or better)
http://www.dvdfab.com/download.htm
(to copy practically any kind of DVD)
http://www.dvdshrink.org/what_en.php
(to shrink copied DVDs into an ISO that you can burn to a normal 4.7GB blank DVD)
http://download.openoffice.org/index.html
(to do schoolwork and work work)
http://www.disc-tools.com/download/daemon
(so you can mount a compressed ISO and access it's contents as if it were a real DVD in a drive)
http://www.nero.com/enu/downloads.html
(to burn discs without many if any errors at all)
You might want to install these.
Many programs require these first before you can use/install them:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=A5C84275-3B97-4AB7-A40D-3802B2AF5FC2&displaylang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=BA9257CA-337F-4B40-8C14-157CFDFFEE4E&displayLang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=200B2FD9-AE1A-4A14-984D-389C36F85647&displaylang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=EB4EBE2D-33C0-4A47-9DD4-B9A6D7BD44DA&displayLang=en
You probably won't need any other programs...
Happy Computing!
If while installing windows you get a blue screen of death then there is a pretty good chance that either your hard drive is bad or your ram is bad.
Once you have windows installed, chances are that things such as sound and display will not be working properly. Typically though, the networking card will work. You should connect the computer to the internet then go to the control panel and run windows update, reboot when it asks, then repeat this same over and over until the message eventually says there are no more windows updates. If your networking card does not work or if the display still doesn’t work properly then you will have to download the drivers manually directly from the manufacturer.
Once all the devices on your computer are working correctly, then you can soon begin to install all the programs, but before we start putting new programs on your computer you should remove anything that is not needed, such as ad based toolbars, smiley programs, chat software, ad based video players, AOL, etc. Anything that your computer doesn’t need to run shouldn’t be on there. The items installed on your computer are listed under the control panel, either in ‘Add/Remove programs’ or ‘Programs and Features.’ Don’t remove everything though, just the non-essential programs.
There are a few tweaks that can be done to save memory and to speed up windows. First you should personalize the appearance of your windows desktop using the control panel . Go to personalize or display, pick the ‘Windows Classic’ theme, select no screen saver under the display, select solid black for the background color. Go to sounds, pick sounds tab, select none, and no startup sound. Go to the mouse options, drag the pointer speed to fast, select automatically move pointer to dialog box, and select no scheme for the pointer, and no pointer shadow. Go to system, advanced system settings, advanced, performance, settings, and select adjust for best performance. If you have windows vista or 7 then go to user accounts, turn user control off, create a password if you don’t already have one. Go to security settings and turn notifications off then hide all notifications. System restore can also be disabled but I suggest you use the least amount of space possible for system restore, from 200MB to 1.25GB. If you plan on having lots of MP3s then open windows media player, under tools-options deselect retrieve additional information from internet on the library tab, deselect retrieve media information, deselect update music files, deselect download usage rights, and deselect automatically check using the net under the privacy options. Right click the desktop, select small or classic icons, select auto-arrange icons, right click the toolbar at the bottom of the desktop, select toolbars, select windows media player. Go to power options, select balanced, change advanced, turn off the display plugged in 1 hour (battery 15 mins), dim 15 mins (battery 10), turn of hard disks 10 mins (battery 5 mins), computer to sleep 300 mins (battery 10 mins), processor min 0% max 100%, wireless max performance both battery and plugged in, no password on wakeup, sleep never, close lid & power button shut down, sleep button does nothing. Save changes and restart the computer by using the shut down button then selecting restart and waiting for it to reboot. Fun! Fun!
Run and install all of Windows Updates over and over and reboot until it says no updates are available. (if you are possibly using a pirated version of windows or just don't know then do not install update #1033, I don't even install this at work because sometimes it screws up the license even though you paid for it and Microsoft will not send you a new license for free even if somebody else has stolen yours)
Now to the hard part, installing all the programs.
1. CCleaner - Optimization and Cleaning FREE
(check all the boxes under system and programs, hit clean, run registry cleaner too)
http://www.filehippo.com/download_ccleaner
2. Spybot - Search & Destroy FREE
(update, immunize, then check for problems)
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html
3. AVG Anti-Virus FREE
(run if you have a virus, stays open all the time, has real-time protection)
http://free.avg.com/us-en/download?prd=afg#tba2
4. Avast Anti-Virus FREE
(run if you have a virus, stays open all the time, has real-time protection)
https://www.avast.com/en-au/index
OTHERS ALL FREE!!!
http://www.7-zip.org/
(to open any compressed files or create your own compressed files)
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/
(to have Firefox if you want it)
http://www.google.com/chrome/eula.html?standalone=1
(to have Chrome because IE is creepy slow)
http://java.com/en/download/manual.jsp
(everybody needs JAVA)
http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/alternates/
(everybody needs Shockwave)
http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/
(don't use it, just install it to get the iPod drivers if made a mistake and bought one by accident)
http://www.mediamonkey.com/download/
(is much better than iTunes, just right click a song and select send-to iPod)
http://www.codecguide.com/download_k-lite_codec_pack_mega.htm
(codecs to play any video, select full install {with media player classic}, check mark all file types)
http://www.codecguide.com/klcp_64bit.htm
(64 bit codecs for 64 bit computers only)
http://www.audiograbber.org/
(to save your CDs off to MP3s faster and better than slow error filled windows media player)
(click compress to mp3, select maximum quality mp3 128 bit or better)
http://www.dvdfab.com/download.htm
(to copy practically any kind of DVD)
http://www.dvdshrink.org/what_en.php
(to shrink copied DVDs into an ISO that you can burn to a normal 4.7GB blank DVD)
http://download.openoffice.org/index.html
(to do schoolwork and work work)
http://www.disc-tools.com/download/daemon
(so you can mount a compressed ISO and access it's contents as if it were a real DVD in a drive)
http://www.nero.com/enu/downloads.html
(to burn discs without many if any errors at all)
You might want to install these.
Many programs require these first before you can use/install them:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=A5C84275-3B97-4AB7-A40D-3802B2AF5FC2&displaylang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=BA9257CA-337F-4B40-8C14-157CFDFFEE4E&displayLang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=200B2FD9-AE1A-4A14-984D-389C36F85647&displaylang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=EB4EBE2D-33C0-4A47-9DD4-B9A6D7BD44DA&displayLang=en
You probably won't need any other programs...
Happy Computing!