Your computer's hard drive can be thought of as being just like a big filing system - every now and then it gets a bit messy and needs some organisation to keep it running as efficiently as possible. This organisation process is called defragmentation - it's the simple (very complex) task of putting all the files into an order which makes them quicker to access.

Don't worry too much about the technical details, or some of the pretty coloured graphs you'll see during this process, but do remember that regular defragmentation (e.g. once a week or month), will help your computer stay in tune.

Before we begin, now's a good time to follow my CCleaner tutorial, to remove all the temporary files from your computer (there's nothing worse than spending a long time filing stuff that's only going to be thrown away).

1. Open My Computer.
   
   
2. Right-click the local disk volume that you want to defragment
   
   
3. Click Properties.
   
   
4. Click the Tools tab
   
   
5. click Defragment Now.
   
6. Click Defragment, and go have a nice long cup of tea - the process may take a while!
   
7. Repeat at least every month (the more frequently you do this, the quicker it will get).