Deleting Cookies?

I have tried AND tried to google this but I cannot get this Anus (Asus) laptop to cooperate and go to the website(s) that give this info. So, I'm coming here hoping to find the answer. I was told this computer is so slow (even when I'm using wi-fi) probably because I need to clear out whatever cookies I have on here. Which I really don't get because I don't use this computer all that much.

In fact I've just used it to come here and send e-mail but still, this seems like something I should or need to know.

Also, how does a person delete their browser history?

I can follow (fairly) simple instructions...but my "strengths" are mostly in reading and writing. Too bad my beloved other computer is now in the process of getting (hopefully) fixed.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

Okay generally you go to settings or internet option, pending your browser, and you can delete all that stuff in there.

So stay on this current hip forums window and go to the browser menu bar and find settings or internet options. In there you should find tabs to find history and cookies etc.

Also if your computer is slow you should try a disc defrag.

 

I Thought You Ate All Your Cookies...... :flyhigh:



Cheers Glen.

 

Maybe I wouldn't be so DAMN aggravated was if I was eating my cookies (firecrackers) but that's another story for another thread.

I went to the settings on the toolbar but after waiting long enough to go get a drink and close the door to herd the cats away from this computer, the window for the settings had STILL not opened.

deargod

thanks anyway

 

might need a restore sometimes they get so slow the only way to cure is a " restore to factory settings "

 

lynn...are you clicking the little gear shaped icon in the upper right corner?...beside the house and star?

 

with windows 8 .....put your cursor in the lower left corner of the screen and click.....should bring up the tiles showing apps......just type 'settings' with that page open[tiles] and the settings will appear on a list to the right of the screen....click it there

or

hit the key on your keyboard with the windows logo....my asus it is bottom row 3rd from left....that windows button will also open the tiles page

 

it depends on your browser but it's usually in "preferences" or something similar. from within preferences, it's usually under a tab called "privacy" or something similar where you can delete the cookies. in firefox it has the option to delete individual cookies, so for example if i wanted hipforums to "forget me" and make me log in again I could delete the cookie for hipforums. there will also be a lot of "tracking cookies" from advertisers so that they can track the frequency of visits to certain pages that happen to contain the advertisements (evil). deleting history is similar and is in privacy as well in firefox. deleting the history really won't affect your web browsing experience though, it's mostly there for the convenience of the user and I use it for finding recently visited pages that aren't bookmarked.

i've never noticed much of a speed improvement from deleting cookies.

 

^^^ this, something else is going on.

if it is a windows machine do the following;

FIRST run any anti-virus and anti-malware software you may have.
then proceed with the following;
from Explorer or My Computer right click on the icon for the "C" drive
in the window that pops up select "Properties" and then "Tools"

now from here you have 3 tasks to do, but the order in which to do them can be important.

1) If you suspect data corruption such as warning messages that the drive is failing, unable to open files with a warning message, etc. then the first step to take is to run the "Error Checking" routine.
Make sure to select the option to check the disc surface for errors as well. It will tell you that it will have to do it on next boot-up, say OK and then reboot the machine and let it do it's thing. This step can take up to 24 hours depending on how large the drive is and how much data is on there.
If you do not suspect any hard drive errors, you can do the defragmentation first, but initially I very strongly recommend doing the disk surface scan first.

2) The next step is to get back to the Drive Properties under the "General" tab again and this time run the "Disk Clean Up" (button on lower right). It will ask you what type of files you want deleted before removing anything.

3) After that is complete, follow the same steps as before, right click drive>Properties>Tools. Now this time select the option to defrag the drive and let it do it's thing.
again depending on drive size, amount of data and how fragmented it is will determine how long this takes.


Other steps/things to consider,
do not use an administrator account, always set-up a user account for yourself and turn on the bitch screens, that way shit can't get installed without your consent.
run anti-virus software again and always

set-up schedules for defragmentation, daily is best because then it only takes a few minutes and keeps your shit straightened up.
set-up schedules for automatic updates and this is important, especially for lap top users;

Microsoft rolls out their updates if there are any that week on Tuesday nights, so LEAVE YOUR MACHINE ON and connected to the internet on Tuesdays, set-up automatic updates to run around 2 AM and updates will be a no brainer.

My guess is that your drive is horribly fragmented and/or you may be infected with malware.

 

you should also read the S.M.A.R.T status of the drive if you suspect hard drive problems. sometimes a failing drive will have no obvious signs but cause strange errors from the kernel/OS that can make it look like a misconfigured system and/or malware infection superficially.

also try running some network tests like ping and traceroute to see if it could problems at your ISP. sites like google.com or harvard.edu etc are good sites to test with ping/traceroute.

 

Thanks so much y'all! I feel like I have enough info and instructions now to actually do something...or feel like I am anyway.

 

i like to use the free version of ccleaner every week or so

need to write down your passwords though vbefore cleaning shit out



http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download

 

install cookie-monster ext..

 

agreed, except that data is meaningless to 99.99% of the population.
Hell I've been messing with computers for almost 25 years and it is still a mystery what some of those numbers actually mean. :dizzy2:

 

My advice... you don't have to follow it, but I've been using my computer for years like this and haven't run into any problems what-so-ever.

Granted, if your computer has 2GB of ram rather than 4GB or up, your computer will be slow as ****.

Download Firefox (or Cyberfox, an x64 variant of Firefox, though it is a bit more complicated touse and has MANY more options).

Click Menu button, click Addons. Search for 'Adblock Edge' and install it. Search for 'Ghostery' and install it.

Make sure to click 'Block All' during the Ghostery setup.


(OPTIONAL [Advanced] SETTINGS)
Next, click on the address bar and type 'about:config' then click "I'll Be Careful"

type 'pipelining' in the search box and double-click the first and last entries on the list ( 'network.http.pipelining' and 'network.http.proxy.pipelining' ) and make sure they are enabled.

Double-click 'network.http.pipelining.maxrequests' and change it to 8

Search for 'ipv6'

Double-click the entry that pops up ( 'network.dns.disableIPv6' ) and make sure it is set to true.
(END OPTIONAL [advanced] SETTINGS)



Also, I don't use any type of antivirus software. I find that it just bogs down the system and hogs up valuable resources. Which is especially apparent on lower-end computers or computers with less than 4GB of ram. Though, I don't do any online shopping or visit sketchy websites (aka looking up porn, browsing for coupons, etc etc). If you do any of those things, an antivirus program will probably come in handy for you and you can find free premium trials all over the place that include up to 3 years of service.

I DO however use cleaning software and anti-spyware/malware applications.

I recommend IObit Advanced System Cleaner. Along with many other IObit programs. In my opinion, they are reliable, trustworthy and very light on memory consumption.

IObit Advanced System Cleaner is an all in one automated cleaning program. Good to run it once a week to clear out any garbage weighing down your system performance.

I also follow up with CCleaner (portable) and Cleanup 452. They get rid of a lot of stuff that IObit ASC misses.

I also recommend IObit Malware Fighter for any infection your computer might have. IObit Driver Booster is also nice to have too to make sure your software, hardware and internet application drivers are up to date. Driver Booster hasn't failed me on many computers I've used it on and I noticed a vast performance increase after applying updates.

Also, if your computer is deeply infected with spyware or malware, Spybot - Search & Destroy is a good utility to run and Malwarebytes is another nice program to have. Though, Malwarebytes I don't like because it tends to imbed itself into the system in some ways. And I make sure to disable 'TeaTimer' and 'Realtime System Protection' with Spybot, because those are also memory-intensive and weigh down performance.



I'll start a thread in the Computer/Technology section with links to this software and more information.

 

why go through all that crap???
her computer is most likely fragmented to death or is hosting malware, the two most common causes of system slowdown.
The only other possible problem could be if the MFT is near capacity, but she would have to have a couple of terabytes of data in tiny files before that would manifest as system lag.

all the BS you posted isn't going to make a rats ass bit of difference if it's taking 15 minutes to load a fucking program. (classic symptom of a severely fragmented drive)
sure you offer some ok advice and mention some good software to use, but don't you think addressing the immediate problem should be the first course of action?

(dammit! bring back the smilie)

do people even bother to actually read posts anymore before spouting off?

 

While defrag is an important tool and should be used often for those with mechanical hard drives I wouldn't continue to just tell people to "just run defrag" without adding "unless you have a solid state drive"... SSD's are becoming more and more popular and you don't defrag an SSD. There are other tools for that. MS Windows claims that an SSD won't show up in the defrag window, but I've yet to see one NOT show up there. Easy way to kill a drive.

I doubt highly that Lynn's system has an SSD, I'm just saying this for the record.

 

The goal was to free up some possibly used system resources before administering a spyware/malware scan. And the problem wasn't very clear to me (which is no fault of the OP). The info I provided was a bit scattered.

 

you might try uninstalling and completely reinstalling the offending programs you are experiencing poor performance from.

the system is spending a lot of time doing .. something. most likely it's disk I/O that's blocking the thread while the I/O is occurring. i'd maybe try looking there, and see if i could determine what was read/write to disk so much. make sure that you're not swapping pages out to disk or you probably need either more memory, or to somehow configure your system to require less of it (and less page swaps).

you may also look at cpu time or thread time for processes. a high idle cpu time could mean a lot of things, but it could likely mean that you're system is searching/traversing through some big gnarly data structure that's gotten out of whack like traversing a binary search tree thats somehow now come to resemble a sorted linked list which can increase your upper bound on asymptotic running time quite some amount and if this data happens to be stored on disk it can really kill performance, even if the filesystem isn't fragmented.

keep in mind that it takes relatively few cpu cycles to max out disk throughput. if you notice bad performance but there's no high disk I/O or CPU activity then it might be a kernel problem or device driver problem (or maybe malware causing these indirectly)

 

Very true and good advice.