How come you recommend Active Ports for seeing what connections are listening and such when all they have to do is use "netstat -a"? How come you tell them about some (non-free) "good" trace routing tools when they can just use the "tracert" command and write out some simple steps to figure out what ISP its from or even just tell them to use something like:
Symantec's Visual Route (Visual Route java app on symantec's site)? Why would you just tell people to check stuff like the win.ini (16-bit legacy) for startups when they can simply use "msconfig". I'd also recommend noting
StartUp Mechanic as it has a database for explanations on what most processes that start up are and makes it easy for a user without much computer knowledge know what's going on and such.
You say things such as: "root kit", but you don't explain what it is. Most people that know what a root kit actually is, probably wouldn't need this guide or you say: "use proxies", well how would they even know what a proxy is or where to find one? And why not mention using an old computer or something as a gateway and explain about those if you want to talk about securing with firewalls for the paranoid? Since you are talking about hackers AFTER they've infiltrated you as well, why not mention how important it is to use some sort of encrypter for your personal information? How would someone know what looks out of place on a motherboard?
I'm not trying to make fun of your article, but these are just some things I think you need to think about when writing something like this. I didn't talk about everything I found, but hopefully you'll look through it again from a perspective that isn't that computer literate and/or security literate.
Keep it up, I'm sure if you stick to it, this will become very comprehensive.