What happens if you don't give your vehicle regular oil changes? What kind of results can you expect if you don't ever change the spark plugs on your lawn mower? How do you think your computer will run if you don't perform regular maintenance on it? The answer in all cases is: It won't run very well.

If your computer is running sluggish, if it periodically needs to be rebooted or doesn't boot up as quickly as it used to, it sounds like it's time for a Clean Up. The following instructions below will give you step by step instructions on how to ensure your PC continues to operate at its fullest potential. These instructions are relevant for machines running Windows XP and using Internet Explorer.

To begin, open up Internet Explorer, that's the blue lower case letter "e", generally shown in the lower left corner of your screen. Next click on the word Tools up at the top of your screen. Once open, click Internet Options. In the middle of that box you'll see a section called Temporary Internet Files. Click the Delete Files button. Click the box Delete offline content too, then OK. Once that is done, click the Delete Cookies button within the Temporary Internet Files section. Click OK there too.

Next click the Settings button. Check for newer versions of stored pages should be clicked to Automatically if it isn't already. Change the Amount of Disk Space to use to 8MB. Click OK twice.

Next go to the green Start button in the very lower left corner of your screen. Click My Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Check Disk Clean up. Use offline content or anything else it asks. It will take a few moments while it is checking how much space it can clean up. When you get the new pop-up window, make sure there are checks in every box. Click OK

After running Disk Clean up, go to Ad-Aware, update and run the program. If you don't have Ad-Aware SE Personal, it's a free very comprehensive spyware removal tool and it's remarkably simple to use. You can download it through Lavasoft http://www.lavasoft.de/support/download/ Highly recommended. After running Ad-Aware, reboot your computer.

You should perform the above maintenance about once a week. Then on an as-needed basis, run Disk Defrag, which you can find in Start, My Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Disk Defrag.

By following the above simple steps your computer should continue to run at optimum performance!

Jay is the web owner of http://www.dsl-in.com DSL, a website that provides information and resources on DSL, DSL Service, and DSL Service Providers. You can visit his website at: DSL Service