By Stephen Bucaro

Are you a shareware junkie? Have you installed and removed many programs from your computer? This can make your computer take longer to start and run sluggish, or even cause reoccurring error messages.

During installation a program copies files to applications folder, Windows folder, and creates entries in registry. The problem is that when you uninstall a program, it may leave behind pieces of itself and entries in registry. Your hard disk and registry can become bloated.

To solve this problem, Microsoft licensed Install Shield software to establish a standard Install and Uninstall procedure. When you install an application on your computer it copies its own uninstall utility to your hard drive. This Uninstall utility properly removes every piece of program and removes every entry that it made in registry.

If an application does not automatically install itself, you can install it with Add/Remove Programs utility in Control Panel. When installing an application this utility searches application for a program named setup.exe. Programs that comply with Microsoft's logo requirement provide a setup program that lists application in Add/Remove Programs list and registers an uninstall utility.

To remove an application from your computer, use Add/Remove Programs utility. Just deleting program without using Add/Remove Programs utility leaves behind pieces of application and entries in registry.

By Stephen Bucaro

Sometimes you need a print immediately, other times you need to continue working with your application while printing. You can make your printer accommodate your needs by configuring your printers "Spool Settings" and "Print Queue".

An application can transfer its data much faster than any mechanical printer can create document on paper. For this reason, when you print, data goes to a "spool" which acts as a buffer between your application and printer.

If you need a print immediately, you can set spool to start printing as soon as it gets enough data to create first page of document. But this forces your application to wait until that first page is transferred to spool.

If you prefer to continue working with your application, you can set spool to start printing after it has received entire document. This moves printing operation to background.

To configure printers Spool Setting, select Start | Settings | Printers. In Printers window, right-click on icon for printer you want, and in popup window select "Properties". In printers Properties dialog box, on "Details" tab, click on [Spool Settings...] button.

In Spool Settings dialog box, set radio button for "Spool print jobs so program finishes printing faster". Then set radio button for either "Start printing after last page is spooled", or "Start printing after first page is spooled".

If need a print super fast, you can set radio button for "Print directly to printer". This bypasses spool entirely. Note: If printer is shared, you may not have option to print directly to printer. If you have required rights, you can temporarily disable sharing.