Tech Support Pits:

From Harold===
Dear Webby
I got promoted, my computer didn't.
I found out that in large companies computers are like the
balls people play with. The people on the loading dock play
basket ball, the people in manufacturing play volley ball,
middle management plays baseball. 

Now I am expected to dress funny and play golf.
The computer that I inherited from my predecessor is not
a golf ball. It is a lemon. If I try to run more than two 
programs at the same time, it locks up within a few minutes.
What can I do ?
Harold

Dear Harold
1) Run Spybot-Search&Destroy
2) Run Diskeeper from http://diskeeper.com (ONE "k" !)
3) Set the diskeeper to run whenever the screensaver 
comes on
4) If the screensaver displays a company logo waving
around the screen, reduce the bmp file of that logo to
64 x 64 pixels (instead of hundreds or thousands of 
Kilobytes)
5) Move your desktop icons into folders. For example, 
make a folder on the C:\ drive and call it "NUM".
Make a desktop shortcut to it.
Drag all desktop icons that lead to numerical stuff into
that folder.
Do the same with "ALPH", for alphabetical stuff like
word processors, contact management, etc. 
Older machines and machines with not enough memory 
really suffer if you have lots of desktop icons.
Also, use small icons in the settings, and in those 
folders choose LIST, not Icons or Details.
6) In the folder view settings choose "Classic View".
Those rounded corners and space wasting stuff on the
left in the XP mode tie up a lot of memory.

If you do all that, then in half an hour your computer will
run more reliably and faster than if your hard drive was 
transferred onto a brand new computer.

Have FUN
DearWebby