Expert: Bobbert - 7/6/2010

Question
Good Morning - I went to Best Buy last night to buy a basic laptop for my wife to use.  I ended up purchasing a Gateway laptop.  While deciding, the non-commission salesperson kept trying to persuade me to have their "Geek Squad" go through the process of "optimizing" the new laptop (for $70) in order for it to give me it's "best performance".  I asked what optimizing entailed and he gave me some "geek-speak" about settings, etc., performing the software updates that have come out between the manufacturing date and today, and removing the trial software that I didn't need, etc.  I also asked why the computer wouldn't already be "optimized" (short of the software updates) coming out of the box.  Seriously, why wouldn't a computer already be set up in "optimal" condition when you buy it brand new?  He did not have an answer for that.  In addition, I asked if all of the laptops they sell would also need to be "optimized" and he said yes.  I bought the new laptop without having it "optimized".  What are your thoughts about this?

Answer
Well, quite simply put, you made the right decision in this Expert's opinion. Best Buy may not pay their people on commission, directly, however they still strongly encourage them to up-sell you service packages and other accessories that you may or may not need. Regarding their "optimization" service - you can do every aspect of that yourself in an afternoon or evening while watching your favorite movie or TV show or some other activity. Windows Update should be enabled by default, which will update the system to whatever Microsoft's latest requirements are (Microsoft more or less configures the update service to download essential updates as required, optional updates are downloaded at your leisure (and generally you shouldn't bother unless you run into an issue where a hotfix or other update is a listed solution from Microsoft or Gateway)).

The other tasks are generally fluff - removing trial software may or may not be something you'd like to do; some of it actually isn't worthless, some of it is, make that decision as it suits you - generally speaking computer manufacturers aren't loading the machines up with spyware and junk anymore so you can more or less expect it to be fairly innocuous applications that the manufacturer would either like you to buy or is being paid to advertise. I would probably suggest removing the vast majority of the trial software, just to free up disk space for your own applications, but other than that there isn't a whole lot that needs to be done with a brand new computer out of the box (so your instincts are correct here) - it's a brand new machine with a brand new copy of Windows.

Finally, a few tips for your new computer, I would suggest installing a quality anti-virus/anti-spyware suite - Grisoft offers their AVG application for free to home users (you can purchase a more feature rich version as well), and McAfee and Symantec (Norton) also offer quality products (and many ISPs will provide at least one of these solutions for free with your subscription - again it may not be the full featured retail copy). I would also suggest keeping your web browser up to date, and disabling some options (on Internet Explorer 8, set the browser to "Medium High" or similar - basically you want it rejecting 3rd party cookies, pop-ups, unsigned ActiveX controls, etc), you might also look into a nifty little application called CCleaner which will (when you run the program) clean out your browser cache and system temporary files as well as check your registry for simple errors. All of these things shouldn't take more than an hour or so to do combined (even if you decide to remove the trial software) and shouldn't cost any money unless you decide to buy an anti-virus solution (Which really shouldn't cost you more than around $50 at most).

Here's some links to the various products mentioned:
CCleaner from Pirifrom:
http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner

AVG Free Edition from Grisoft (you'll have to click through a few offers for their premium suite):
http://free.avg.com/us-en/226284?cmpid=fs_hp_testa_226284

McAfee's Home User landing page:
http://home.mcafee.com/Default.aspx

Symantec's Home User landing page:
http://www.symantec.com/norton/index.jsp

Generally speaking, you shouldn't need to spend $100+ for any of these applications - the more premium versions are either targeting small business/office users or are simply upsold products with minimal benefits (either way, you shouldn't need that feature-set for a single machine).

If you have any further questions, feel free to ask.

-bob