I am cleaning out my computer, I want to be sure I wont delete something that will damage the comput

when I go to Control Panel--Add/Remove programs I see so many programs that I do not know what they are and why I have them. I want to be sure I can remove these programs/files and not damage my computer or any other programs...I disabled the Automatic Windows Update Center because everyday there were so many updates my computer needed but I found it awkward. I have so many ''HotFix for Windows XP (KB888795)''. I do not know what they are but there are a lot of them and the only differnce between them all is that the number in the ( ) is different. Than I have so many ''Security Update for Windows XP ( ????? ), once again there are a lot of these listed and the only difference between them all is that the numbers in the ( ) are different. Can I delete all of these updates? If I delete the updates that were updated to my computer through the ''Windows Security Center'' automatically, would there be a issue? I need some advice, I need to clean up my computer. Thanks

I am cleaning out my computer, I want to be sure I wont delete something that will damage the computer. Help?downloads

Those KB123456 and Q123456 numbers refer to Microsoft Knowledge Base articles. If you go to microsoft.com and plug in that number you can see what they do specifically. They are the security updates for windows as well as other patches and are needed to keep your PC secure. As far as the other programs you can usually uninstall them, however if it were me I would do a google search (I mean yahoo search) to see what they do. If you are running out of hard drive space, you can use a nice utility called ccleaner (2 c's) that will go through your PC and clean up unneeded files, logs, etc. Good luck!

I am cleaning out my computer, I want to be sure I wont delete something that will damage the computer. Help?house call

If you remove or block security updates for windows, your machine will soon be infected with the latest and best garbage going. These are your only protection.As for other programs, do NOT remove anything until you have checked what it does. If in doubt do a Google search for it.