According to a recent survey conducted by Microsoft, 60 percent of those polled say their online lives sometimes feel more disorganized than their physical lives.

Crystal Hornsby, a construction project engineer from Vancouver, Wash., is feeling the need to get digitally organized this year. “I have two mobile phones, two e-mail accounts, hundreds of digital pictures, separate online calendars for work and home, and I’m an active Twitter, MySpace and Facebook user,” she says.

Hornsby’s experience is far from unique. According to a Pew Internet & American Life Project study from Dec. 2008, the share of adult Internet users who have a profile on at least one social networking site has more than quadrupled in the past four years from 8 percent to 35 percent.

Lorie Marrero, certified professional organizer, author and founder of ClutterDiet.com, thinks there’s still hope for people like Crystal who feel overwhelmed by their online lives and the idea of organizing it all.

“Our kids, jobs and shrinking budgets give us plenty to juggle in our offline lives. Now, with so many people using various online services, it’s no wonder that many are overwhelmed at the prospect of getting digitally organized too,” she says. “Although it can be daunting, it’s a necessary step toward gaining the extra free time we crave, and finally feeling in control of our lives — both on and offline.”

To get even the most scattered computer user started on the road to freedom from digital clutter, Marrero recommends five easy tips that can help make your digital life seem more manageable:

1. Organize Your Online Activities
Have too many social networking and online accounts to keep track of? Consolidate online activities in one place with Windows Live. Partnerships with popular sites — including Facebook, Twitter and Flickr — allow you to aggregate activities from these third-party sites — such as digital photos, tweets and status updates — into your Windows Live ‘What’s New’ feed, so you can easily share content with the people in your network from one site.

2. Unclutter Your Desktop
Treat your desktop as you would the top of your actual desk and keep only active files and shortcuts there for convenience. Use your My Documents folders for more lasting storage. Clean off unnecessary shortcuts that clutter the screen.

3. Get Your Files in Order
After you get your desktop sparkling clean, take a look through your folders. Can you consolidate? Are there old files you can remove, or drafts that are no longer relevant? Remember, your time is valuable and storage space is plentiful, so archiving to a folder or external storage space is usually a better use of time than wading through lots of old documents.

4. Time for Your Inbox to Drop a Few Pounds
Do you really need those attachments in an e-mail? Save your large files to an online storage drive like Windows Live SkyDrive, which offers 25 GB of free storage. Easily upload videos, photos and files, and share them with whomever you’d like — without overloading their inboxes.

5. Optimize Your Computer’s Performance
For greater efficiency and to avoid the heartache of technical problems, remember to update and run important utilities like spyware and virus scans and defragment your hard drive periodically.

“After a week or two of following these five simple tips, you may find that you have a bit more time to finally go for that run, or play outside with the kids,” says Marrero. “I tell my clients that the key is to ensure that your computer and online services work for you as productivity tools, instead of creating more clutter and hassle in your life.”

Courtesy of ARAcontent

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Get Your Computer Back in the Fast Lane

Does your computer take forever to load programs or change pages when you’re surfing the Internet? Have you ever been in the middle of writing an e-mail only to have the screen freeze and force you to reboot and lose all your work? There are few things more frustrating than a slow computer, but it doesn’t need to be that way.

Having a professional look at your system can be costly and buying a new computer is often unnecessary. There are some steps that you can follow to keep your system running at its best.

1) Limit open programs and windows.
If you have too many Internet windows open or are working with a variety of computer programs at once, your computer might run slowly. Limit open programs and windows to maximize your computer speed.

2) When in doubt, reboot.
Sometimes there are things we just can’t explain with computers. If yours is running slow, try rebooting. Often this is all the system needs to begin functioning at a normal pace again. Although many programs have automatic retrieval of work, it’s a smart idea to always save what you are working on before shutting down.

3) Use a registry cleaner.
Even if you’re extremely careful about how you use your computer and never download questionable material, over time it is inevitable that your system will accumulate unwanted registry entries, errors, clutter and debris.

The most common causes of problems are the installation and removal of software, online games, application crashes and upgrades of software programs. While many errors will go unnoticed, the more errors your computer has, the greater the chance that you’ll experience trouble. But there is something proactive you can do to protect your system: install a one-click tool called Advanced Registry Optimizer 5 (ARO 5) that will safely and efficiently scan, identify and repair errors.

Advanced Registry Optimizer 5 was awarded four stars in May 2007 from CNET’s Download.com editorial staff which said, “Advanced Registry Optimizer will clean your computer’s clock and keep it ticking.” To take advantage of a free trial offer, log on to www.sammsoft.com and click on the link that says “Show Me the Product Now.”

Once you have downloaded ARO 5, just click the “Run” button to install the software to your PC. The program will then do a complete scan and diagnosis of your computer’s registry and tell you how many errors are present. It will then fix the first 20 problems completely FREE of charge.

There’s no catch. The company is confident you’ll love the personal version of ARO 5 so much you’ll consider purchasing the unlimited commercial system which retails for $29.95. To purchase ARO 5, go to www.sammsoft.com and click on the “Products” tab. You’ll find ARO 5 in the Product Gallery. Simply click on the “Buy Now” button to continue with your purchase.

Courtesy of ARAcontent

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