Laptops are one of the most popular holiday gifts. If you got a new one this season, you're probably excited to get it set up and optimized for working and playing on in the future. There are five things I think are essential to do with any new laptop:
- Get rid of bloatware so you don't have unwanted programs taking up needless space on your hard drive. Ccleaner is a great utility that can take care of this for you.
- Set up laptop security, including: Setting up strong passwords for your user and administrator accounts and installing security programs such as anti-virus, laptop recovery, and encryption programs. Doing this at the beginning will help protect you in the case of your laptop ever getting lost or stolen.
- Install system updates.
- Install essential programs and copy over your documents from your old computer. A file syncing program like Dropbox or SugarSync make getting your personal and work files synced over a breeze. AllMyApps and Ninite are two apps that can grab the most popular programs of your choice and create a single installer program for all of them, saving you time and effort.
- Backup your system and (optional) create a custom install disc.
For more details, see: 5 Steps to Setting Up a New Laptop
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