PC Tune Up

[Terry]

I use AVG antivirus on my new desktop and AVG is telling me that I have serious interference issues and I need to purchase AVG PC Tune UP.

Is this a legitimate fix or repair? Should I do it or are they just trying to sell me another program?

Your opinions please,

Terry

 

[DaleB]

Is this a legitimate fix or repair? Should I do it or are they just trying to sell me another program?

Maybe, no, and yes -- in that order.

You can do a lot to clean up your own PC. Whack temp files and old downloads, uninstall factory-installed bloatware and programs you no longer need (or never did), clear out your browser cache and maybe adjust its size. If you have extra junkware installed in your web browser like extra search toolbars and crud, get rid of them. When you're all done do a couple of complete defrag runs. None of this will cost you one penny, and you won't have yet another AVG program trying to sell you updates and subscriptions.

 

[CT4ME]

Agreed. I hate most "free" programs, as they are really marketing vehicles to sell you more stuff. Get CCleaner and also run its registry cleaner. Our computer consulting company likes MicroSoft Security Essentials as a free anti-virus... never expires and they don't try to sell you anything. BUT, these days, it doesn't matter what virus protection you use, if they can trick you into clicking something. For the most part, they no longer attack your computer, browser, or operating system, they attack YOU. If you click something, it will most likely go right past your anti-virus program (at least until it's too late). Windows 7 defrags the hard drive automatically on a schedule. If you have XP, get MyDefrag.

ps... AVG PC Tune UP is a real program... not rated very well.

 

[kgruber]

Scam.

 

[RJM62]

Agreed. I hate most "free" programs, as they are really marketing vehicles to sell you more stuff. Get CCleaner and also run its registry cleaner. < snip >

This, plus run a CHKDSK /f. That, plus a good malware scan, is about 80 percent of a professional tune-up. The rest is uninstalling useless programs, stopping unnecessary crap from auto-starting, and so forth.

One thing you can't easily fix for yourself on XP and older systems, that I used to check for on every tune-up job, is MFT fragmentation. There was no function in XP and older Windows to defragment the MFT. It had to be done from one of several bootable disks, preferably after a full-drive backup, because once in a while it went wrong in a big way.

Generally, because of the time needed to backup the drive and the small but real risk of something going wrong during the MFT defragmentation, I only did it if the MFT was fragged to the point that it was affecting performance. There should always be two fragments (the MFT and its backups). Up to six or so fragments didn't seem to affect performance much, if at all. Up to a dozen, maybe. More than that, usually.

If you have XP, it's worth at least checking whether your MFT is badly fragged. You can do it by analyzing the drive in Defrag and reading the report. If it's badly fragged and you're experiencing performance problem of the laggy, general sluggishness sort after everything else has been fixed, it's probably worth finding a good tech to do that one job for you. (Most, unfortunately, won't have any idea what you're talking about.)

-Rich

EDIT: As far as anti-malware programs are concerned, ESET's the only one I like nowadays.