A friend asked me to look at his computer to see why it was running so slowly.

He had already taken care of the most important task - checking for and clearing viruses.

But the computer was still running slow.

So we dug a little deeper. Using a free tool, I showed my friend that his computer was starting 20 unnecessary programs each time it booted up.

By themselves, each of these programs grabbed only a little bit of memory and computer resources, but the combined effect of all the little hitchhikers together was to starve his computer.

With the secret tool, my friend was able to clearly see all the unwanted programs, and with just one click, stop them in their tracks.

The secret tool we used is Startup Control Panel, which can be downloaded for free from http://mlin.net/StartupCPL.shtml

Another free tool that can do the same thing is CCleaner, which can be downloaded from http://www.ccleaner.com/