Quick Start Guide

From zero to a working AI agent on your Windows PC. Follow the steps below — the whole process takes about 10 minutes.

On this page

1

Prerequisites

What you need

  • Windows 10 or 11 with PowerShell 5.1+ (pre-installed)
  • Internet connection for installation and LLM API calls
  • An LLM API key from any provider (Claude, GPT, Gemini, GLM) — OR a local LLM via Ollama

Optional but recommended

  • + Telegram or Slack account — for messaging your agent (Telegram is easiest to set up)
  • + A Gmail account for your agent — keep it separate from your personal email
  • + GPU or NPU — accelerates win-whisper (speech-to-text) and win-ai-local (Ollama)
2

Install PCClaw

Open PowerShell and run:

irm pcclaw.ai/i | iex

The installer handles everything: Node.js, Git (via winget), OpenClaw, PCClaw skills, and Moltbook registration.

Script blocked?

If you see "running scripts is disabled", run this first:

Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope CurrentUser
3

Choose Your LLM

The installer asks which provider to use. Here's how they compare:

Provider Best for Cost
Anthropic (Claude) Best overall agent performance ~$20/mo subscription or API
OpenAI (GPT / Codex) Strong reasoning, large ecosystem ~$20/mo subscription or API
Google Gemini Large context window, Google integration Free tier available
GLM (Zhipu AI) Chinese language tasks, budget-friendly Free tier available
Local LLM (Ollama) Privacy, offline use, zero API cost Free (your hardware)

Power user tip

Skip the interactive prompt with a one-liner:

.\install.ps1 -ApiKey "your-key" -AgentName "jarvis" -Provider "anthropic"
4

Post-Install Setup

After the installer finishes, OpenClaw launches an onboarding wizard. Key decisions:

Connect a messaging channel

Telegram is the easiest — create a bot via @BotFather, paste the token. Your agent becomes reachable via Telegram messages.

Enable web search

Connect a search API (Brave, Exa, or Perplexity) so your agent can look things up. Brave Search has a generous free tier.

Install the gog skill

Gives your agent access to Gmail, Google Calendar, and Google Drive. Follow the OAuth setup when prompted.

Enable session memory hook

This is the most important hook. It lets your agent remember past conversations and build up context over time. Enable it when asked.

5

Agent Identity Files

Your agent's behavior is defined by markdown files in its workspace folder. These are the key files:

%USERPROFILE%\.openclaw\
AGENTS.md — core instructions, what your agent does
SOUL.md — persona, tone, communication boundaries
IDENTITY.md — name, personality, emoji
TOOLS.md — which tools to use and when
USER.md — info about you (the operator)
config.json
skills\ — PCClaw skills live here

Example: AGENTS.md

You are Jarvis, a personal AI assistant running on a Windows PC. Your responsibilities: - Monitor my calendar and send pre-meeting briefs via Telegram - Scan email every morning and flag urgent items - Take screenshots and OCR documents when asked - Manage my to-do list in Microsoft To Do You have access to PCClaw Windows skills: win-screenshot, win-ocr, win-clipboard, win-notify, ms-todo, win-scheduler

Example: SOUL.md

Tone: professional but friendly, concise Language: match the user's language (English or Chinese) Boundaries: - Never send emails or messages without my explicit approval - Never share my calendar details with others - Ask before installing any software via winget - Never execute PowerShell commands that delete files without confirmation
6

Workflow Examples

Tell your agent what to do in natural language. These examples use PCClaw's Windows skills:

📋

Morning Briefing

"Every morning at 8 AM, check my Google Calendar for today's meetings. For each meeting starting in the next 2 hours, send me a Telegram brief with attendees, agenda, and any relevant emails from the past week. Use win-notify to pop a Windows notification when the brief is ready."
gog (calendar) win-notify win-scheduler
📸

Screenshot + OCR Workflow

"When I say 'capture this', take a screenshot of the active window with win-screenshot. Run win-ocr on the image to extract text. Copy the extracted text to my clipboard with win-clipboard. Send me the text and the image on Telegram."
win-screenshot win-ocr win-clipboard
🎤

Voice Notes (NPU Accelerated)

"When I send you a voice message, transcribe it with win-whisper. Summarize the key points, create a task in ms-todo for each action item, and read the summary back to me using win-tts."
win-whisper ms-todo win-tts
📁

File Organization

"Every Friday at 5 PM, scan my Downloads folder with win-files. Categorize files by type (documents, images, installers, archives). Move them into subfolders. Send me a summary of what was organized and flag any files larger than 500 MB."
win-files win-notify win-scheduler
💻

System Health Monitor

"Check system health every 30 minutes with win-sysinfo. If CPU usage stays above 90% for 5 minutes, or RAM exceeds 85%, or battery drops below 20%, send me a Telegram alert with the top 5 processes by resource usage."
win-sysinfo win-notify
7

Security Checklist

Your agent has real access to your PC. Follow these rules:

!

Use a dedicated machine or user account

Don't run the agent on your primary work laptop with sensitive data. A separate Windows user account or a dedicated mini PC is ideal.

!

Define boundaries in SOUL.md

Explicitly list what the agent must never do: delete files, send emails without approval, access certain folders, install software unsupervised.

!

Start with read-only API tokens

For Gmail, Calendar, and other integrations, use read-only scopes first. Add write access later once you trust the agent's behavior.

!

Don't expose to public channels

Only let your agent respond in private conversations. Public channels expose it to prompt injection from other users.

!

Keep your API key local

PCClaw stores your key in local config only. Never paste it in public channels, shared docs, or group chats.

!

Run security audits

Periodically run openclaw security audit to check for known vulnerabilities in installed skills.

8

Troubleshooting

"Node.js not found" after installation
Close and reopen PowerShell so the PATH update takes effect, then run the installer again.
"OpenClaw not found" after installation
Same fix — restart PowerShell. If it persists, run npm install -g openclaw@latest manually.
win-whisper is slow or not working
First run downloads the Whisper model (~1.5 GB for medium). Be patient. For faster inference, make sure your GPU/NPU drivers are up to date — whisper.cpp uses hardware acceleration automatically when available.
Skills not loading
Check that skills are in the right folder:
ls $env:USERPROFILE\.openclaw\skills\

Each skill should have a SKILL.md file. If missing, reinstall:

Copy-Item -Recurse .\skills\* "$env:USERPROFILE\.openclaw\skills\"
Agent acting weird or ignoring instructions
Check your identity files: AGENTS.md, SOUL.md, and TOOLS.md in %USERPROFILE%\.openclaw\. These files define behavior. If corrupted, delete them and OpenClaw will regenerate defaults on next launch.
How to update PCClaw
openclaw update

This updates the OpenClaw core. To update PCClaw skills specifically, pull the latest from GitHub and copy skills to your folder.

Ready to start?

Open PowerShell and run:

irm pcclaw.ai/i | iex