Monday, 8 June 2015

BASIC COMPUTER MAINTENANCE TIPS



Computers are expensive, and with all major purchases you probably want to protect your investment. Fortunately, it is not difficult to keep your computer healthy and in good working condition, only if you adhere to these maintenance tips.
Before you start working on your computer, make sure the table or area where your computer is, is free from dirt or liquid. A dirty keyboard doesn’t look nice and can cause your keyboard not to work properly. Use cotton to clean the surface and gently hit the surface of the keyboard on a table to remove dust, food, liquid and other particles that may have stuck underneath the keys, which can prevent them from working properly.
If you are using a mouse, don’t allow food particles or liquid to get underneath, which might cause it not to function well.
            When your computer is loaded with files and programs that the hard drive can carry, you will always experience hanging on your computer. To minimize this problem, always run disk clean-up to remove unwanted files from the hard drive, so as to have more free space in the drive. Disk clean-up scans your computer for temporary files and other files that can be deleted with your permission. Also delete unusable or irrelevant files from your computer especially those heavy files. To run disk clean-up, go to ‘My Computer’, right-click on ‘Local Disk or Hard Drive’ and click on properties, then Disk Clean-up. Or simply go to ‘Control Panel’ and click on ‘Performance and Maintenance’ and click ‘Free up Space’.
Do not open too many windows on your computer while working; it slows down the speed of the computer. Stop clicking continuously if the program fails to respond. When you click once or twice, and it didn’t respond immediately, wait for it to respond. By clicking continuously you are compounding the problem and making it to take more time to respond.
            Protect your computer against virus or malware, by making sure that your computer has the licence and latest version of antivirus installed in it. Antivirus software helps to protect your computer against virus and also prevent malware from being installed. It also removes malware from your computer. New malware is being created all the time, so it’s important to update your antivirus frequently. Most antivirus programs can do this automatically, but you have to make sure that the feature is enabled. You can do this by going to the ‘settings’ of your antivirus software. Also, always scan your computer to remove any virus that may have infected the computer. And any external drive you plug into your computer, make sure you scan it first before opening the drive. Make sure the time and date on your computer is up-to-date. If not, it might affect your work or program especially when working online. 
Imagine what happens if your computer suddenly crash. You would lose any important document, photos or other files. It may be possible to repair the computer, but your files maybe lost forever. You can prevent this by creating backup copies of all of your important files on an external hard drive.
            As a computer operator or you own a computer, you must know how to fix or resolve minor problems on your computer. It is not all the time you seek the services of an engineer to fix one or two problems on your computer, which ordinarily you can fix, thus saving money and time. When your computer is not powering (in terms of a desktop computer), simply trace the power cable to check if it pulls out from the power source or a shift from the socket. If your mouse refuses to work or move, unplug the cable from the port on your computer and plug it back. Same applies to your keyboard, but you have to re-start the computer for the keyboard to start working. Do same to the network when the network icon is showing ‘cable not connected or limited connectivity’ on the screen. In fact, anything that has to do with cable or plug on your computer, trace it to the source when it is not functioning. After trying on your own, the problem still persists, consult an engineer or a technician.


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