Good afternoon Adam.
Don't worry about recycling the thread, your questions do pertain to this process and might prove valuable to someone else reading it. You can mark the thread unsolved if you want.
Sounds as though you had a hiccup (installed a utiltiy) and that is resolved.
You have a lot of questions, no doubt. Sevenforums has a lot of answers. It's rather exciting having new found knowledge, but it can be a dangerous thing too.
Take your time learning, but the bottom line is this: Almost every "utility" out there has the potential to screw up your system. There are some really bad ones. Rather than try and answer every "is this utility" any good, just answer the question yourself with a great big NO!
There is no reason you need ANY add-on "utility" - Windows 7 has all the tools you need. That's really all you need to know. Every other piece of crap out there is a wannabe Windows utility. They make money, even the free ones.
Man, you've learned a lot in a few days. Give it a chance to settle in.
Read, read, read.... but do not touch. Do not mess around trying this or that. Take your time, you're young and you have plenty of time to learn this stuff.
It's probably best, in the short term, for you to post a question on SevenForums BEFORE trying something. This is where a new thread would be most helpful.
Say for instance you wanted to know about computer maintenace. Open a new thread asking "What are the best practice for maintaining my computer?" You will get responses based on other member's experience, some repsonses might point you to a tutorial. The tutorial seciton is the definitive place to get answers - read the tutorial that post referenced. As you've seen with Greg's tutorial, they are well written step-by-by instructions that have been tested on many machines by many members.
Be careful not to overload yourself - take things slowly one at a time and digest the information.
The really good thing is that you know how to reinstall Windows if you ever need to again. It isn't something anyone does very often, only when warranted by conditions of the machine.
Keep your Upgrade disc in a safe location, somewhere you can find it.
Put the tutorial on a flash drive for offline reference.
There are a few things pending, the tutorial should provide everything you need.
What things? to keep it simple, one step at a time, just Windows Update until exhausted
You've already learned not to trust anything not provided in Windows 7. I'm glad you caught it early and remedied it before any real problems cropped up.
Don't feel that it would be stupid to ask questions.
When I first got a Win7 machine, I asked a lot of questions.
Win7 is the best Operating System (OS) to date, but it is different. A lot of people upgrading from XP or Vista had to give up doing things the old way and let Win7 run as it was meant to run, without having to use add-on utilities and without having to tweak anything.
If you don't know what to do, ask a question.
Can't find something familiar, ask a question.
Want to learn, ask a question (this requires reading material suggested in posts - might be on SF, MS, or some other site...or it might be a book in your library)
Please understand that Sevenforums is a technical site, not a Win7 school. Prople are expected to have a base knowledge of computers and Win7. Everyone's knowledge and experience is different so members take extrordianry measures to help everyone looking for help solving an issue on Win7.
It still amazes me how courteous every member is to other members. There is a wonderful ethos (nice word Colin) on Sf that isn't found many places. Every one knows how to say please, thank you, you're welcome, and see if this helps...
Long post to answer your question about utilities
Bill
