10 computing tips for less stressful IT

1. Run backups regularly. The time and effort expended in recovering from a disk problem when you have no backups is out of all proportion to the much shorter time it takes to instigate a backup routine. It may take you an hour or two to set up the first time, but there are tools that can run automatically and copy files off to a removable disk or network drive.

2. Anti-virus software. Keep your anti-virus subscription up to date and update your signature files every 14 days or less. Otherwise you will may get a virus on your machine that could wreak havoc with your files. Norton, McAfee, Sophos, Panda and other reputable firms offer a range of products. If you get a computer virus - you only have yourself to blame.

3. Check your emails carefully. Set your virus software to check your emails, certainly all incoming ones, and possibly all outgoing ones as well. Also set it to do a system scan every week or so (most packages will allow you to automate this to run overnight) - some viruses that come on to your machine via a web page are only caught using this method.

4. Protect your email address. Make sure your email address is "munged" or encoded in some way on your web site - spammers use web sites to locate valid email addresses. Ask me for more details on doing this. Email addresses can be harvested from plenty of other places, such as Ebay, and the address books and hard drives of any of your correspondents who have an email virus, so this isn't foolproof but it helps. And don't use "catch-all" email addresses at your ISP - you will just invite spammers to send garbage to wghmtmf@yourdomain.com and every other conceivable combination of letters.

5. Report spam. Go further than just using the spam filters provided by your ISP - REPORT IT. If you sign up for a Spamcop mail account, you can have the pleasure of sending an abuse report to the spammer's ISP. It's all done with one click of the mouse and you can do your bit to help get these abusers of your inbox shut down.

6. Get a firewall. Make sure you are running a firewall - either the Windows one, Zone Alarm (see opposite) or other third party product. This will stop hackers gaining access to open ports on your computer and maybe taking over your machine.

7. Stop "net send" spam. Turn Off Windows Messenger in your Control Panel "Services" (ask for more details if this means nothing to you) - this prevents annoying spam messages being flashed up on your screen in Windows dialogue boxes.

8. Terminate spyware. Use AdAware or other spyware software to find hidden cookie files etc. on your computer, and delete them - these could be passing on information about your surfing habits, and probably came installed with another piece of software. They can also interfere with what you see in your web browser. Virus and firewall software alone won't stop these.

9. Banish pop-ups. Windows XP-SP2 prevents pop-ups by default, so they don't appear every time you visit certain web sites. You can also install the latest Google Toolbar. As well as having a very useful Google search button always to hand, its mere presence automatically stops all popup windows unless you choose to let them through.

10. Use a content filter. See the links page for information about the OpenDNS service.