Bloggers Need to Care About Their Computer Too

February 17, 2011 - Last Modified: February 17, 2011 by Drew Rafferty

If you are a blogger, you most likely have your own computer and work from it daily. This means that you will definitely need to be caring for your computer to ensure that it stays in working order at all times.

Today, I’m going to cover some simple routine maintenance and prevention strategies so you can save your computer from disaster.

First, I am going to cover the different types of software you need, which are:

An AntiVirus software (Avira is recommended)
A Spyware/Malware removal software (Malware Bytes Anti-Malware)
A junk cleaner (CCleaner)
Firewall software (Zone Alarm free firewall)

Having all of this software to hand is the key to successfully caring for, maintaining, and repairing your computer if it gets slow.

First, you have the AntiVirus, which helps you to scan and remove viruses. Then you have the spyware/malware removal tool for removing any nasty infections. Thirdly, you have a junk cleaner, which is software known as CCleaner. Finally, to put a wall between you and the Internet, you will have a firewall.

The key is knowing when to use these programs for arising problems or for maintenance to avoid problems. You will not need to worry about figuring this out, as I breakdown when you should use the software and in what order.

Weekly or Monthly Tasks

Weekly or monthly tasks are to help fend off any major issues with your computer. For this, it will mean using your AntiVirus software, spyware software and junk cleaner. Running all three each week or month is necessary to keep the amount of infections and junk on your computer minimized.

When Your Computer Gets Slow or Infected

If your computer gets slow or infected or has any odd software popping up, you want to do the same as your weekly/monthly tasks only ensuring to start with using your spyware/malware software, as it is the most powerful in removing the worst infections that are causing most of the issue.

In conclusion, if you take time to try this exercise today and get used to the process, you should generally never have any major computer issues and thus never be held back from cranking out a new blog post. I can answer any questions in the comments section.

About Drew Rafferty

Follow @techiezine

I'm Drew from the Techiezine blog. I'm a geek as you can probably guess and also highly interested in business, economics and especially Internet business which includes blogging. I've decided I want to spread my wings and I'm now here to write some content for all you Famous Bloggers fans. Follow my blog on Facebook.

{ 40 Responses }

Shreya says:

We really don’t pay too much attention to this stuff except when it goes wrong, and I have a feeling we’re like a lot of other people out there. The only time we care is when our computer bogs down, then we call our computer guy. Do you think it’s reasonable for an average Joe computer user to dedicate time each week for these tasks? How much of a time investment are we talking about here?
Taimoor says:

hah.. interesting bro.. thank you for remembering me about my computer.. :D
billy says:

Good article. I find cleaning dust essential to good computer maintenance. As well as that my workstation has been running a lot smoother since using a fully automatic defragger.
Wasim Ismail says:

True, I love it when you buy a new computer and everything seems so fast, and over the months it starts to go slow, these days my Mac has also started to go slow, I need to give it a good clean, anyone got any tips to make an Apple Mac faster. :) Thanks
Khalid Hosein says:

Re: AV, I've used the free version of AVG for many years with good results. I recently checked with 2 independent reviewers of AV software, and while AVG doesn't rank as highly as it has in the past, it's one of the few remaining vendors with a free solution. Do check the reviews at: http://www.av-test.org/certifications?order=protection_desc&lang=en http://www.av-comparatives.org/comparativesreviews/summary-reports One additional suggestion to your list, Drew: 1. Run a periodic defragmentation job on your computer (I schedule it). I use the free and excellent JKDefrag. http://kessels.com/jkdefrag/
Dennis Edell says:

Excellent advice. I highly recommend AVG, their free version is better then most paid out there. lol
Mani Viswanathan says:

I've faced this issue many times in the early part of my blogging career. Later by Experience I tried to solved the pc problems by myself. I must add that AV's never work upto their full potential.
Nasrul Hanis says:

I scan my PC daily and defragment monthly. This is an awosome thought because blogging is not just about SEO, designing but also how your PC works!
Alex says:

I think anyone knows how important having the right protection is. If you don't protect your data you might end up with your credit card information stolen and all your accounts hacked. I don't use an anti-spyware because I have it integrated in my antivirus but I do recommend the use of a cleaner, that deletes all the temps folder. Mainly because a lot of viruses usually start their life in the temp folder but also because you can save some space by keeping it clean.
Murlu says:

I generally take an hour or two each week to go back through and clean out my computer for unwanted files and while I'm doing so I run virus checks and defrag my hard drive; keeps it squeeky clean so it doesn't slowly die out from adding tons and tons of crap.
Shariq says:

My favorite Security softwares are; Antivirus: Avast Home Edition Antispyware: Spyware Doctor Firewall: PC Tool free firewall System cleaner: IOBit System care
Mavis Nong says:

Hi Drew, Great tips. I use Norton to take care of these issues for me. Thanks for sharing. Mavis
Lennart Heleander says:

Hi Drew, Those 4 software is all you need plus follow my advices; don’t open email you don’t know who the sender is. Don’t be on porno sites – casino sites – chat sites – all other stupid sites and blogs where it is possible to get a virus from. Think before – not after.
Sherryl Perry says:

Timely reminder Drew. Thanks. I use Kaspersky Internet Suite and AdAware but I have been meaning to get Malwarebytes too. No more excuses from me. I'm following your link now.
Tinh says:

I wish that you could have published this article 10 days ago then I would not have lost my domain. Anyway, thanks for that and hackers are not smarter than we think and we need to be more careful about our activities too :-)
Vijayraj Reddy says:

u r right... i did not had AntiVirus and i lost a blogging day due to virus attack, now i have AVG internet security, but my laptop has become slow, any other good AntiVirus?
- Drew says:
  
  Try the anti-virus mentioned above or read my computer maintenance manual here: http://www.techiezine.com/free-computer-maintenance-manual/
Fran Aslam From Onlinewriter says:

Hi Drew: I found you here also. You are right about your post. It is very important to take care of your computer with these anti spy products. as when you are marketing, you do get thousands of cookies and a million spy's attacking your computer. My computers has Nortorn 36o, and it does tell give me a report of daily attacks, and their nature. Thanks for writing about it. Fran A
Dana says:

For me, antivirus is must while the others is optional. And, the free anti virus is more than enough for us as bloggers since we are individual users.
tushar says:

great post. I am damn sure the point that has been raised in this post is often neglected by the majority. Computer security has become an important issue these days
Anne Sales says:

I didn't know I had to use separate softwares for each issue. I only use Anti Virus and CCleaner. Somtimes my AV is conflicting with Windows Defense and Firewall. I have yet to look for a very good anti-spyware. Thanks for all these help.
Richard says:

It's really important to be careful where you surf. Otherwise, even the best anti virus software won't protect you. However, if you don't download funky files and go to weird websites, then you could even just use microsoft security essentials and be fine.
Iroko says:

Well, now I know what to do, I have been having some problem with my laptop, though I do have an anti-virus...but about slow pickup of pc, do know anything about registry cleaners?
- Drew says:
  
  I wouldn't really bother with registry cleaners, CCleaner has one built in you can tey but cleaning the registry is a pretty useless task as compared to using malware bytes, ccleaner and your virus cleaner, you can also download my PC maintenance guide here: http://www.techiezine.com/free-computer-maintenance-manual/
Jan Husdal says:

I've gone through Norton, Norman, TrendMicro, F-Secure, and most recently, Microsoft Security Essentials. In my opinion, the latter has what it takes for the average Internet user, while the more tech-savy among us will probably go with Norton, although it has a huge overhead that takes time get around and understand, even if you know your way around the inside of your computer. Norman is pretty good, too, but TrendMicro has a tendency to block too many sites that at some point had malware issues, which makes it a hassle to use if you do a lot of Internet surfing.
Doc Sheldon says:

Great post, Drew. As was said, many people wait until they have a major problem, and by then, it's often too late. Preventive maintenance can save you a lot of heartache! @ Wayne John - Avira has a free version, which is quite good. I've used it for years, and find it very aggressive... never had a problem get through to me. Avast is another good free program, probably on a par with Avira. As for Norton... I've used it. Even paid for the 360 version. When I got infected anyway, I threw it out and installed Avira again. Only nice thing I can think of to say about Norton is, "at least it's better than McAfee!" ;)
- Wayne says:
  
  I didn't see that on their site. I took a quick gander, so good to know that. I've had nothing but stellar experience with Norton, but I know that any product is bound to have their own flaws. Nothing in software is ever perfect, right?
Mike says:

I absolutely agree with you about this. Besides threats online, there are several other dangerous threats coming from your personal computer as well, like trojan, viruses and other things that can shut down your business easily. So, always safe guard your PC first, because, at all angles, it's your equipment to make money online.
Hung Hong says:

I used Kaspersky Internet Security . The best way to protect our computer is clean virus regular and avoid to access stranger links. Anyway, we cannot protect 100% since my friend's computer got Trojan and he lost his domain with some affiliate /PayPal account last week even he used antivirus software.
TJ McDowell says:

We really don't pay too much attention to this stuff except when it goes wrong, and I have a feeling we're like a lot of other people out there. The only time we care is when our computer bogs down, then we call our computer guy. Do you think it's reasonable for an average Joe computer user to dedicate time each week for these tasks? How much of a time investment are we talking about here?
James Johnston says:

Great write up, everyone should worry about spyware/viruses getting on their system. Its so easy to get infected and a lot times you may not even know your infected until its to late. I use to work on systems that were infected with spyware and viruses and lot of those machines only had a firewall. As for tools, I use CC cleaner and several other tools that CC cleaner doesn't removed or has been updated to remove certain files yet. Its been a while since I have had to repair an infected system (no longer doing pc repair services) but the tools I use are: 1. Avast Security Premium or the Free depending what I need for the client needs. Virus scanning - downloads, email, network, and browser scanning. 2.Spybot Search and Destory - spyware / malware dection and removal - Old but still works great. 3. CC Cleaner - for junk removal and when Spybot can't repair or remove the junk files. 4. Commodo Firewall - Free firewall. But the internet security package is pretty good. Commodo has some nice utility tools that I sometimes use, if I need some additional security. As for Norton 360, I haven't used their products in years. There are plenty of security suites that I trust more than their products. I read several articles that not all the features of Norton will not work with Firefox. I use Firefox mostly, so if these sites are reporting this correctly, this isn't the best tool to protect your computer if you use Firefox. If some could verify this is still an issue that would be great...
Darren Scott Monroe says:

Drew intriguing suggestions. I am with Wayne on this one what is your opinion of Norton?
- Wayne John says:
  
  I'll add that I use Norton for all my systems at home; about 6 altogether. Only 3 are mine, the others are for my "internal clients". Being the resident techie nominates me to the position of tech support...so I decided that I'd rather pay for a really good, well known service over anything else. I don't have virus or malware issues in my home. That doesn't mean a thing, it's just the reality of my environment. These other ones can do the exact same imo...I'd just rather use one than four. I should have elaborated better on my first comment. I'm interested in hearing what Drew has to say also. While I'm a programmer, I don't necessarily enjoy this aspect of dealing with computers. I'd rather they just work, and allow me to code away, than having to deal with these types of issues.
- Drew says:
  
  Personally I don't like Norton and paid versions of any security/maintenance solution are my nemesis. I've grew up using all the free stuff and have found if you use the right concoction, as mentioned above then you do OK. I explain this a bit in my manual: http://www.techiezine.com/free-computer-maintenance-manual/
  - Wayne says:
    
    That's just it though, you have to find a concoction. I don't have the patience for that. My geekness only goes so far, hahaha. Great article though, and in the end, it comes down to exactly how much effort you want to put into your protection and maintenance. Very important stuff no matter how you slice it up. Cheers Drew!
Rick Byrd says:

Hey Drew: Great post! I could imagine having issues and being without my laptop for even a short period of time. I have learned a lot about how to protect my computer over the years because I have had several computers severly infected with viruses and malware. I have not used Avira before. I am currently using Avast for my antivirus software. I do like and use the other tools you mention. Take care! - Rick
Wayne John says:

Or, just use Norton 360, which will do all the above automatically, and more. Yeah, you have to pay for it, but you have to pay for Avira too.
- Michele Welch says:
  
  @ Wayne Good to know Norton 360 does it all. It's such a pain researching different products for different functions! @ Drew Good recommendations. I've unfortunately been the victim of a virus attach in the past so this type of information is very useful. I currently use Malware, AVG and PCDoctor which I know have their limitations. ;-) All the best!