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Windows 95

Help

1. Close all programs.

2. Run Scandisk from the Start/Programs/Accessories/System Tools. This program will tell you whether your hard drive is working properly. Sometimes, errors reported here are fairly meaningless, but other times, Scandisk will find files, and even entire directories, with nasty problems.

3. Delete all temp files. Go into Explorer and right-click on the C: drive. Select "Find" and type in "*.tmp" to find all files with the "tmp" extension. Delete all of these files. Generally, all files with the ".tmp" extension are just temporary files created and left behind after a system crash.

4. Run a virus scan. Many companies offer free trial versions of their virus scanning programs on the Web. Check out www.mcafee.com for a free 30-day trial if you don't already have a virus scanning program. Viruses can wreak havoc on your system.

5. Restart the system and see if you're still having trouble.

Many times, these simple steps will pinpoint problems relating to slow systems, crashes, and weird behavior. If you're still having problems, check Control Panel / System, autoexec.bat, config.sys, win.ini, and system.ini for any weirdness. Of course, these files are a bit more complex, so you should know what you're doing before playing with them.

Online Windows Tips . . .

Type "welcome" from the Start/Run dialog and you'll see the Windows 95 welcome dialog again, which has more tips on how to use Windows 95, in case you turned off that dialogue a long time ago, like most folks.