Updates tend to be organized into the following categories:. Running and installing updates is very important, but doing so can also be easily overlooked. While people tend to bellyache about updates and, yes, sometimes they do not go according to plan , they are more likely to help your computer than hurt it.
Updates fix newly discovered security flaws, exploitable software vulnerabilities, critical bugs that can lead to crashes, and other terrifying things that we are probably better off not knowing ever existed. Hopefully, the information in this article will help readers remember to run regular maintenance on their computers in order to keep them all running as smoothly and efficiently as possible.
And remember… only YOU can prevent unnecessary lag. By: Brian Sobus December 16th, By: Nathan Brown November 23rd, By: Tristan Schleining November 4th, Categories Follow Us Subscribe. A new window will open. Are You Defragmenting Monthly? Are You Regularly Installing Updates? Updates tend to be organized into the following categories: Security: These fix issues related to security flaws. Enough said. If the non-technical friend has got data over but not MUCH over 2 gigs and does not change often, then I would suggest the free edition of Crashplan which lets them back up to one of your PCs that have Crashplan installed encrypted and compressed, of course.
In some cases relatives mostly! Sotiris Filippidis. One more comment: I didn't know about Join. I think it has a time limit for non-commercial purpose usage, but you can just reconnect if the connection drops. Just did that last week for my dad again The best thing is if you start building up machines out of your spare parts or old computer pieces and end up with a machine which is way better and give to them. On the next visit you realize that they are still using their old piece of crap, because they were not able to transfer there documents to the new machine or install some programs.
I simply installed CrossLoop on all machines of family members, in order to avoid to much travelling : hf. The most common one I get called in for is the fake security popup aftermath.
My favorite person to do tech support for is my mum, she always does exactly what I say, provided I give her detailed instructions. Doug Paice. And maybe a spare watt power supply or a 60mm fan for emergencies. I understand. That picture is bad. I wish I could say I hadn't seen it before. I have a server in my house that I keep under a workbench in my basement. Long story, it made sense at the time and I never got around to finding a better place for it once it was there.
I opened it up after a couple years and the interior was completely encased in sawdust. I was shocked that it still worked. Took the shop-vac to it, and it's still running, now well into its fourth year at that location. The machine itself is a homebrew AMD Duron that's about 6 years old.
The robustness of this crappy hardware is often amazing. Good article, very familiar scenario. The worst one I find is the machine that won't get Windows Updates any more for some reason. How do they do that to their machines? It's always a massive pain to fix.
I used to do machine control software in a factory environment, and having an industrial airline around was very handy for cleaning dusty machines. You need to make sure your airline has a dryer and doesn't have lubricating oil injected though. I've always heard warnings about using home vacuum cleaners, because of static build up on the nozzle. I don't know if this is true or not.
Finally, who else is old enough to have taken apart office PCs in the days when people smoked in offices? I am - just. John Carlyle-Clarke. You should never vacuum your PC or other electronics. Jonathan Peterson.
It seems a bit strange to trust the OS company "guilty" of making the vulnerable system with the only anti-virus :. I use FileHippo to update all of the miscellaneous applications. I hear Ninite can also used for similar purpose. Firefox 3. Firefox 6 is actually something like Firefox 4. Axel On. What does work pretty well for dust removal is to find a piece of hose or plastic pipe, ideally about mm ID, and ideally about 1m long.
Take the machine outside and blow into the tube, using the other end as an air jet to blast the dust out. Internal diameter needs to be right to get a good high velocity air flow without making it too hard to blow through.
Length needs to be long enough that you don't get a face- or lung-full of dust without again being too hard to blow through. I've used this improvised solution many times! A post full of the truth, I recognised every single point on your list, many many times have I been at peoples houses and had my wife wait on me downloading updates etc its almost impossible for me not to do this as you suggest.
Why do people need and install all those toolbars also, my fathers a particular offender using incredimail just checkout the crap that stuff sends people. Several colleagues gathered around my pod today when i was reading this all nodding their heads and laughing, all had been in these situations.
I have read all this and really enjoyed it. Learned a lot and remembered a lot. I rarely startup my pc and have recently repaved so I don't need soluto YET. I thought other than the safe firefree airplane friendly TSA approved hibernation in windows 7, they also made it so that defraging was no longer necessary. Can you set me right on this? Can you also help me figure out how to get live mesh to run on my local area network?
It is advertised but is almost impossible to get working. Unless they mean backup all your local pcs to the cloud NOT within your network sans internet. Thank you Scott. Love the new site by the way I used it for two days before noticing it.
Jake Markhus. After giving them the education and lecture on good computer maintenance, are you still friends? Most people that let their computers get to that point aren't later going to following those instructions because they just want it to work. They don't care how, they just want it to work. Oh look, Scott is here. He can get it to work and I won't have to do anything again. Lance Farquhar.
Huge fan of Portable Apps I have a Thumb Drive with all the utility apps I need to quickly clean up a friend's PC without having to have internet access. And for those apps that aren't portable, I just have an archive on the drive with all the other installers I will need.
The entire Sysinternals Suite fits nicely on a thumb drive. It's a digital Swiss Army Knife! I always make sure, sysinternals tools are on my flash drive. A programmer's family reunion. Leyu Sisay. Great, Scott! Now he's going to have nothing but computer problems since you cleared out all the dust and cobwebs. Some friend you are -- that thing will never be the same again! Epic fail in a couple weeks The problem with cleaning the inside of a computer is: Most computer come with a warranty sticker that says that the warranty will void if the sticker is damaged.
So, your non-computer savvy friend will never open the computer by fear of voiding his warranty. Pierre-Alain Vigeant. I'll second Sotiris Filippidis's suggestion of Crashplan. I use it any time I'm helping out friends with 2 or more PCs in the same house. It's invisible and painless, and the data is protected unless the house burns down. For people who pay lip service to backups but can't be bothered, it provides free peace of mind. For startup programs, I've stopped removing items from the Startup folder and the registry.
It works, but prickish applications like anything from Adobe and Apple will recreate those shortcuts any time an update is applied and for Adobe products that's like every twenty minutes. Instead I run msconfig and uncheck the items in the Startup tab. If you've never used msconfig before, be sure to reboot after applying changes.
On your first boot you'll usually see a warning prompt about startup changes - check the 'Don't Remind Me Again' box and click Ok. I typically run Avast and SpyBot and haven't had any problems or noticed significant redundancy. I think I also leave Windows Defender on but all the Windows security notifications bleed together in my memory.
David Fauber. I had not heard of Join. As for getting involved in the first place, I understand the obsessive-compulsive apparent need to rescue people from a degraded machine but I have found that it's far more mutually satisfying if I merely plant the seed in their mind that I might be able to fix their computer if the need arises. When they call frantically two months later asking if I could look at their "crashed machine" their gratitude after bringing the machine back from apparent death -- and refusing payment other than replacement parts -- does far more for our friendship than if I had become the "well actually" guy the first time and inserted myself into their computing life.
Think of it like the "Prime Directive" in Star Trek: if they don't ask you to get involved with their computer then don't. You can play hero later but if you fix things proactively and they screw it up, it will be your fault. If they are totally screwed and you recover their machine, then even if they screw it up again you will only be seen as someone who can bring a machine back from death rather than the smarmy dude who did "something" to the box and now it isn't working right.
This post is a great starting point for PC maintenance. But to me, the fact that I have to spend so much time maintaining my computer demonstrates why things like the iPad are gaining popularity. You essentially don't maintain it not completely true, but the story is better. I easily spend more time maintaining my computers 2 computers less than 3 years old than the cars I own 21 years old between the two of them.
Thank you for the tips! I had a problem with too many Auto Start up programs which were delaying the boot time of my laptop. This is really a helpful information, because I also suffer these problems a lot mainly auto startup programs.
This blog will really help me a lot. Thanks for sharing this. I really appreciate the content of this article. Each and every tip mentioned in this post helps to increase the speed and performance of our PC.
The failure of any one of these can affect the working of our Computer system. If by chance, any internet files can be accessed by any unauthorized person, it may create problems for both individual and big companies. So I always use BitRaser software by Stellar Data Recovery to completely erase internet activities like temporary internet files, cookies, history, favorites etc.
Very useful tips for PC users like me. Presently I am facing little issue with my monitor which starts flickering all of a sudden. I am thinking to get it checked as I cannot solve this problem myself. I got some more tips for computer maintenance and making computer bit faster.
Great tips, I have been using my PC last 8 years, but now I changed to a laptop. So could you write an article that share tips like this? Hi David, most of the tips mentioned in this article can also be used for laptops. Thanks a lot. Thanks for the extensive list! This is a list I need to refer to regularly, since my computer slows down a lot. Thanks for all the research you put into this. You can greatly reduce dusk inside your desktop computer just by keeping it asleep when not in use.
One nice program that does that is WinSleep. I use it to stay asleep or hibernate when not using the computer, and it also shows a graph of when the computer was awake or asleep hourly over several months. Abhijith, thanks for your post.
Almost software resides in registry keys, they have the instructions what to do. This article is very helpful to me and all computer users. All these tips will help me in maintaining my PC easily. You certainly have some really good tips here! Even if I have been using laptops for over 15 years now, I will have to admit that I still managed to learn a few things from what you posted! I can confirm that it will always be better to do whatever it takes to prevent breakdowns rather than find a fix once it has happened!
You have covered almost all the necessary points in Computer Maintenance. Will put them in use. Your email address will not be published. Skip to primary navigation Skip to main content Skip to footer. Last updated on: January 9, Fight Off Dust 2. Ensure Proper Flow of Electricity 4. Refitting Your PC 5. Use a Cooler Stand for Laptops 6. Mind the Use of External Keyboards 7. Update Your Software 8. Register and Use Software Products 9. Back Up Your Data Use an Antivirus Program Perform Antivirus Scans Install Windows Updates Use an Anti-Malware Software Update Your Device Drivers Get Rid of Junk Files Delete Internet Files Defragment Your HDD Clean Up Unused Software Check Auto-Startup Programs Do a Battery Check Unused, Big Files Are Bad Take a Look at Task Manager Upgrade Your RAM Use Cloud Storage.
See also. Sharing is Caring Share. Abhijith N Arjunan. Abhijith N Arjunan is a passionate writer and blogger from Kerala, who finds ultimate joy when writing about trending technology, geek stuff and web development.
Category Computer. Tags Computer Maintenance , Evergreen. What people are saying I think these tips will help me in Computer Maintenance.
Completely agree. Thanks for sharing these wonderful tips among us and it is really good job and appreciable one thank you regards. Hi Abhijith, Thank you for the list. It was really good work to make this list. Thanks for sharing an amazing check list for PC users to maintain it properly. Thank you Julia. Any suggestion or addition in the list is welcome.
Thanks, Varadhrajan.
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