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Some Computer Help Please
Posts: 3357
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Karma: 66
If you're an asshole or have no desire to help me please go elsewhere.
I probably should have come here before I did this but, I'd like to know how what I did will fix my computer. If you have knowledge regarding computers and cleaning unnecessary files off them, I'd appreciate your help.
I use Windows XP
Lately my computer has been running really slow and lagging on almost every program I use. So tonight I was going through my Add/Remove Programs getting rid of stuff I don't use. After getting rid of some stuff I went into My Computer to fish out the rest when I cam upon a folder called "quarantine" When I think of quarantine, thoughts of sick people being hidden away from healthy people come into my head. So I figured, these files must be the ones that my school's virus scanners pick up. So I selected them all and deleted 29,902 files, roughly 120,00KB's of what I believed was crap slowing down my computer. After about 10 mins. of waiting for my computer to delete everything, I emptied my Recycle Bin and restarted my computer. After the restart my computer has been running much faster than it was before. Everything started up quickly and I can move between programs with no delay.
Although I am happy with what has happened so far, was this the right thing to do? Did I actually do something good for my computer???
Thanks
Posts: 7163
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Karma: 917
well if you don't know what was in there, and your computer is working fine, then you're set. usually i can delete anything i don't know what it is. all i really have are a few programs, movies, and pictures, so its not a big deal. as long as your computer is working, who cares, your shit is fine.
Posts: 6072
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Karma: 18
Quarantine is where your spyware/antivirus programs stores files it disables and removes from your hard drive. You can either have them deleted, or 'quarantined' this means they are effectively gone, but still there on your computer if something comes up like it deleted a wrong file or something. You basically just deleted a bunch of disabled spyware.
Posts: 945
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Karma: 50
Don't know how much good getting rid of the quarantined files did, what did the most good was freeing up space by getting rid of stuff in add or remove programs.
Files are quarantined in the first place (rather than deleting them all together) because some viruses will infect files that are needed to run certain software. If everything is working faster then good, but I dont think getting rid of that small amount of files did anything.
Posts: 183
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Karma: 11
yes, you did the right thing in deleting the contents of that folders. all that is in there are temporary files that your computer doesnt need, they just take up space and memory. so yes, the result you got should have been expected, and no harm should come of this. I recommend downloading the program ccleaner . it is a very useful program that will delete ALL of your temporary files, and i run it about once a week and it will delete around 100 mb. makes your computer faster too.
Posts: 31125
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Karma: 336
Soak your machine in boiling water for at least 10 minutes to make sure you killed all the bacteria and viruses.
Posts: 3357
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Karma: 66
word, thanks for everyones help
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