General PC Maintenance & Troubleshooting

3. Check Hard Disk Space

The free space on a hard disk is used for many system related functions, such as for spooling print files before they are sent to a printer and for keeping temporary files for everything from Web Browsers to Word Processing. Once the available space is depleted (Say for the purpose of the excercise it is below 1 GB) then all functions of the computer will be affected. This is one of the biggest causes of computer problems. If disk space is severelly depleted (Say below 200MBs, then the computer can become unuseable).

To Check Hard Disk Space:

> From the Desktop, open My Computer (double click)
> Select the Drive which ends with (C:) with the RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON
> Select Properties from this menu

If the free space is below 1GB, then it is advisable to clear some space.
One way is to remove programs as in Step 1 . Another way is to remove temporary files, such as in Internet Explorer, The Recycle Bin and temporary files left behind by applications.

To Clear Temporary Internet Files:

> On the Desktop, RIGHT CLICK the Internet Explorer Icon
> Select Properties from the menu
> From the GENERAL TAB (default), select Delete Files
> Select OK from the Delete Files dialogue box

This can take up to 15 minutes depending on the number of files and the speed of the PC.

To clear tempoary files left behind by applications:

On Windows 2000:

> Go to the START button
> Select SEARCH menu
> Select FOR FILES AND FOLDERS
> In the "Named" box type the following exactly *.TMP;*.BAK;*.OLD

Ensure that the look in folder is set to Local Harddrives (C:)

> Then hit the SEARCH NOW button

After a couple of minutes, this will display a list of files which end in TMP, OLD or BAK

> From the EDIT menu, select SELECT ALL to highlight all the files in the list
> Check the files to make sure there are not any files which you require
> Then hit the DELETE key
> Then hit the YES button to confirm the File Delete
> You may be prompted (Are you sure you want to move it to the recycle bin?) about certain files
> As long as the files end in OLD, TMP or BAK then select YES TO ALL for each prompt.
> Then close the FIND FILES Window

On Windows 95 /98 /ME PCs;

> Go to the START button
> Select the FIND menu
> Select FILES OR FOLDERS
> In the "Named" box type the following exactly *.TMP;*.BAK;*.OLD
> Ensure that the look in folder is set to (C:)
> Then hit the FIND NOW button
After a couple of minutes, this will display a list of files which end in TMP, OLD or BAK
> From the EDIT menu, select SELECT ALL to highlight all the files in the list
Check the files to make sure there are not any files which you require
> Then hit the DELETE Key on the Keyboard
> Then hit the YES button to confirm the File Delete
> You may be prompted (Are you sure you want to move it to the recycle bin?) about certain files
As long as the files end in OLD, TMP or BAK then select YES TO ALL for each prompt.
> Then close the FIND FILES WIndow

To empty the recycle bin;

On the desktop, RIGHT CLICK the Recycle Bin icon
Select EMPTY RECYCLE BIN
Select OK on the Confirm File Delete Dialogue Box.

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