Decluttering a computer frees up hard drive space and increases speed of operation; both very good things for business owners that rely on their PCs to operate correctly. There are three main areas to tackle: unused programs, deleting and archiving old files, and organizing.
Remove those unused programs. You know the ones"the software you bought and installed and wound up hating, games you downloaded and no longer play, or chat programs you no longer utilize. In addition to what you add to your computer, Windows OS already came with tons of useless software demos. Start with those and begin deleting (just be careful, and refrain from deleting anything you don't recognize until looking it up first). This action can be performed by accessing the Control Panel and going to Add or Remove Programs. If you are a Mac user, check out the free program WhatSize. This program does all the hard work for you, beginning with scanning your hard drive, showing you how much space you have, and ending by deleting any unneeded files and software upon your command. Once that is done, move on to your desktop. For some reason or another, substantial amounts of shortcuts and documents (including folders containing unused desktop icons) end up being saved to the desktop and then never looked at again (except maybe once). Take all that stuff and drag it to the recycling bin. From here, clean and defragment your hard drive. Access the Control Panel and go to System and Maintenance. Clean first, defrag last.
Delete or archive old files. Start going through all documents, images and photos, movies, and music and decide what you can live without. Certain graphics files and high-resolution pictures can eat up an enormous amount of space on your hard drive. If you don't use them often but don't want to delete them, put them on an external hard drive or burn them onto a CD or DVD. Also, don't forget about email"that can really pile up and usurp much-needed space (this only applies to programs like Outlook that actually store emails on your computer). Emails with attachments hog space, so clear out the Sent, Deleted, and Junk folders, then go through the Inbox to get rid of what you can in there as well. Another place to check is your web browser. Every few months, go through your Favorites and delete the ones that are no longer favorites"believe it or not, these take up space too.
Now for the fun part"organize! Reflect on your paper filing system in your office; mirror this same method on your PC. Your brain is already used to finding documents in that manner, so it should be doubly easy to find it on the PC if done the same way. Create folders and subfolders inside the main Documents folder to organize content"but don't get too crazy with subfolders or it'll get just as messy as it was beforehand and you won't be able to find anything. If you have a ton of bookmarks saved in your browser, perform the same process with those; create folders, and subfolders if necessary, to keep all those bookmarks easily accessible. Under the Bookmark menu go to Organize and take it away!
