TAKE T FULL CONTROL OF O ALL YOUR APPS

Get G your PC in shape

Applications— programs you run on your PC—are a constant. They’re always there. We all use them, and our machines would be dusty husks without them. But they do have a tendency to get a bit out of control, particularly if a system has existed for a long time. An application almost always consists of a bunch of files; the more apps and games you have installed, the more files exist on your hard drive. This isn’t, in itself, a problem, until your drive is filled with ten thousand chunks of goodness-knows-what, and a single search operation takes half an hour because Windows has decided it must meticulously inspect every single thing. And here’s a quiz for you: What was the last program you installed, and where is it on your hard drive? We’d wager that, in the first count, you’re probably not sure, and in the second, you hammered through the process, let it ensconce itself in goodness-knowswhat folder, and have absolutely no idea what other things it scattered over your hard disk.

Going with the flow of program installation is normal and entirely understandable, but it’s not difficult or onerous to get yourself organized, and a well-sorted PC will stand you in good stead for continued use. Unless you use extreme methods, you won’t ever be able to stop the miasma of random files seeping through your PC. But we’ll show you how to seek them out, and how to remove unwanted programs entirely. We’ll even show you new ways of installing software that make it easier to manage, update, and uninstall when you’re ready. And if the thought of installing software is giving you some form of filesystem OCD, we can teach you how to make your own portable apps that don’t need installing in the first place, or how to integrate your favorite apps into a custom build of Windows 10 that starts a clean PC exactly the way you want it.