6 Simple Ways To Put A Computer Technician Out Of Business

I got to thinking today about my job, career, life or whatever you want to call it. I'm a computer consultant/technician or as most would call me, a bonafide geek. I do mostly house calls and business disasters, but I'll build a website here and there. But that does not matter here, what I am getting at is that there are so many computers out there that have problems that they should not be having, and it is simply because most people are not educated in general maintenance and prevention.  I suppose I'm the same way with my truck as most people are with their computers. The mechanic says "You need to change your oil every 5,000 miles," "Flush your air conditioning fluids every 30,000 miles" and "Don't do doughnuts in my parking lot..." wait, the last one was the police report, not the mechanic, anyway, you see my point. Without basic knowledge of how things work, how can we possibly prevent disasters?  Well, we do change our oil every so often, and we do flush our AC fluids, and as far as my parole officer knows I no longer rip up the parking lot, but my point is someone had to let us know the basics! So here goes.Computers need a few basic things to run, and a few more to run smoothly.  Let's talk about the "more" aspect. When you buy a computer you get an operating system, like Windows XP or Vista. (Yea, I'm leaving the rest out for now, because you non-windows people don't suffer nearly as much as the rest of us do!) That's great and all, but they tell us we need a firewall, and AntiVirus, and Spyware prevention, and pop-up blockers, and the list goes on! Well they are right. As unfair as it sounds, you do need all of those things! Fortunately there are free options to nearly everything you are "required" to have. So instead of writing some ridiculously long article let's just nail them one by one and I'll tell you the free or open source alternative.You Need: Anti-Virus Software: AVGFree is a free alternative.Anti-Spyware: Spybot Search and Destroy is a free alternative.Popup Blocker: The Google Toolbar is a free alternative.Firewall: Windows XP and Windows Vista have built in firewalls, but they do need a little bit of configuration for them to work properly. This means you probably already have one, but it's just not setup correctly.Spam Filter: There are so many free email programs out there that do amazing jobs at blocking spam that this is nearly obsolete, but just to name my favorite you should sign up with Gmail immediately. They have an amazing spam filter built into their free service. If spam is still an issue for you, tell all your friends that you are signing up for Gmail.  Seriously, get with the times. Anonymity and unnecessary file cleaners: CCleaner is an amazing, free, tool that not only removes tons of unnecessary junk that accumulates over time. It also removes your "Internet tracks." This means no one can easily look at exactly what you have been doing. (Looking for a new job while at work? Cover those tracks! Looking for a new, um, well you pretty much know what most people want to remove from their computer so I don't think I even need to type it.) Anyway, I guess what I'm trying to get across is that keeping a computer running smoothly (and most importantly without spending any additional money) is the same to me as keeping my truck on the road is to my mechanic. (Though I don't think he can control my urge to drive on the sidewalk.)Don't panic, you can install all of those programs I listed there by yourself and there are plenty of people out there that will help you do it if you can't. Honestly, I would probably be out of work if every computer had those programs installed by default.  Almost all of my clients are computer owners that would be fine if they just knew the basics, or in this case, simply installed the basics!