Checking the Size of Your Email Folder

For Outlook to perform efficiently, it is important to keep up with your email and archive regularly. If your mail file gets too large, you’ll start to experience problems. Often, the only solution is to reduce the size of your mailbox. If you don’t clean up or archive, and the mail file keeps getting larger, you will see random problems with your Outlook, and sometimes your whole computer.

We recommend that you keep your mailbox to around 500MB. Once it gets to around 1GB, you may start to see some slowness in your email. If it goes over 2GB, you’ll probably experience crashes in Outlook, and other random issues.

It’s very easy to check the size of your mailbox by following these few steps (steps are based on Outlook 2007 and may differ slightly for older versions):

1. In Outlook, go to select Folder List from the Go menu at the top.
2. On the left side of the Outlook window, scroll all the way to the bottom of the folder list.
3. Click once on “Folder Sizes”.
4. It may take a minute, but Outlook will calculate your total mailbox size, and the size of each folder.
   
   If “Total Size (including subfolders):” is bigger than 500,000 KB, you should be aware that your mailbox is getting large. Scrolling down through the list will show you the size of individual folders. These numbers may help you see if a certain folder seems large or is something that can be archived.

Probably the best way to avoid problems is to set a reminder once a month to clean out old mail. Make sure your Deleted Items folder is empty, and clean out your Spam\Quarantine folder. At this time you can also archive any folders or email that is no longer needed in your active mail file. We have a How To that will help you create, move, or open an archive. You can find it here: http://it.cas.psu.edu/273.htm

Checking the Warranty for your EN Computer

Up until now, we’ve focused on changing software settings or uninstalling programs to speed up your computer. Today we’re going to show you how to check your computer’s warranty status, and its purchase date. It is inevitable that a computer will slow down over time as applications are updated and as users accumulate more data, not to mention the wear-and-tear on the hardware. As a computer ends its warranty period, it’s usually time to look at budgeting for a new one.

For EN computers (these steps also work for all Dell computers), Dell provides a quick and easy way to check the warranty status and date of purchase for your computer. All you need is the Service Tag from your computer, which can be found on the silver Penn State Univ label we've placed on all EN computers. For non-EN Dells, or if you can't find that Penn State label, you can find the Service Tag on a Dell sticker located on your computer.

1. Go to http://www.dell.com/support (this website is also listed on the Penn State Univ label).
2. On the left side, click Warranty Information.
3. From the middle of the screen, click Warranty Status.
4. Type in your computer's Service Tag (from the Penn State label) and click Continue.
5. On the Service Contracts and Warranties tab, you'll find various shipping, system, and warranty information.
6. If the section for Days Left shows zero, or only a few months remaining, you should talk to your supervisor or start to budget for a new computer purchase.

Cleaning out your Startup Folder

Today's tip should take about five minutes to complete. We're going to delete items from your Startup folder. Some applications, like Adobe Acrobat, put an unnecessary tool or tray item or system monitor in Startup. These items all try to run while your profile is loading, causing everything to slow down. Also, most Startup items continue to run all day in the background, taking up resources and slowing your computer's processing time.

To remove these items, follow these quick steps:

1. Go to Start - All Programs - Startup
2. Right click on one of the items, e.g. HP Printer Toolbox, and choose Delete.
3. Click the button "Delete Shortcut" on the Confirm Shortcut Delete window.
4. Repeat Steps 1-3 until Startup is empty.
5. Once you are finished, right click on the Recycle Bin and choose Empty Recycle Bin.