Maintaining Your  Computer's  Health 

All Computer troubles  can be classified under   three major  groups.  (1)Failure of  Electronic parts            Sudden temperature variation and aging are the main  reasons  (2) Failure of  mechanical Parts        Undergoing  excessive force, heavy vibration ,shocks ,normal wear and tear are the main reasons   (3) Malfunction due to  Software's.         Malicious codes and buggy software's are the main reasons

Other Related Subjects    Optimize Your Desktop    How safely remove unnecessary  Startup Items

How to prevent failure of electronic components?

       Frequent power failure, high voltage spikes , loose contact, directly switch off the computer, hot and humid room temperature are suddenly  vary   the temperature of electronic parts and kill that.

•  If You are facing   frequent  power failure and voltage fluctuation  you must need  a quality UPS (Uninterrupted Power supply).
•  Don't use bad Power extensions  and low power rating   cables to  power  your CPU and monitor. Completely avoid loose contacts in plugs. Avoid  Your CPU sharing power  with  other Audio systems, TV, and fridge from a single point of power source. Such high wattage appliances draw high current during start up. That may cause your system restart. 
• At the back side of your CPU  there may be a small switch 110v/220v.power selector. DON'T touch that  for fun. Better put a sticker on that switch. check the switch display the same voltage rating  of  electricity in your place.
• Use power cable with ground pin, and ensure your CPU and monitor case grounded well, or you may get electric shock  and sometimes error messages in windows 
• Do not try or mix  the  power adaptor of your scanner, printer, and laptops with each other. They may differ in their voltage, Ampere, and Polarity.
• Do not shutdown and switch it on again when you leave the computer just for a while. Frequent on  /off  may decrease the life of your CPU. That not means you leave the computer24Hours ON. Give some rest to  your CPU, and to you also.
• Do not  cover CPU and monitor  with any thing .They need good ventilation. Otherwise Electronic parts inside  getting too much hot and soon lost  their life.

How to prevent failure of mechanical parts

•  Hard disk is the  main mechanical part in a computer. Unexpected termination of power may finish the life cycle of a hard disk Do not  directly switch of the computer. Always shut down the computer using the proper way. .   Start--> shut down--> OK.
• Processor cooling fan and power supply cooling fan may fails to run, some time cables may locked between the fins of fan. This will lead to processor halt.
• Do not put scratched ,broken CD's inside the drive, It will damage your drive due to its fast spinning.
• Do not put bended floppies in the drive. Its metal cover may lock inside the drive. Careful in the case of laptops.
• Do not spill Tea, coffee , soft drinks on  the  Key boards, specially laptops ,and top of the monitor. sticky and conductive  nature of such liquid make your  hardware's useless.
• Laptops are highly delicate to shock. If you carelessly drop Your laptop  may easily damage the display panel and mother boards. 
• All  In and Out  sockets are directly attached with the mother board. Applying  excessive force  while connecting external connectors  may damage mother board .
• While carelessly closing the lid of  laptops, a floppy or small microphone  you placed above key boards can damage the display panel.:-(
• Vibration or shock over pc may easily dislocate PCI cards from its slots. Always put the pc vertically. Never put the mother board side up.
• When connecting  keyboard, mouse  USB  pin ,and monitor cable on computer check the orientation of connecter. If you try to connect reverse applying force  may damage the pins as well as the motherboard.
• Do not open case and try to remove any parts while the system is running 
• Sometimes Your mouse pointer may not follow as you wish. Open the bottom round plate of mouse .Clean the Ball and vertical, horizontal rods with clean cotton ear buds. You can save little money
  Use a good quality Optical Mouse to get ride of all of your mouse problems.
• Do not leave your printer for a long time without using it. Your costly ink cartridge may become Useless. If you want save money by refilling your ink cartridges, then do it before the cartridge completely get empty.
• Smokes from the environment may deposited on the lens of  CD ROM and affect it.. Don't touch the lens of CD ROM in Laptops with fingers.
• Don't use unknown chemical cleaning liquids to clean Laptop screens and CD's .May be it react with the plastic surfaces and spoiled it. cotton cloth alone or wetted with little waters is a good cleaner

Software problems

Clean the hard disk

• Keep some extra space around 200MB free in C drive for the normal operation of windows
  To do this Click START -> Programs->accessories->system tools -> Disk cleanup.
• Clean all the temporary internet files ,recycle bin and temporary files in your C drive.
  Remove unwanted files from the Desktop and also from My documents . Low disk space in C drive may  corrupt the windows 
• Delete all unnecessary temporary files.
  Click Start->Find-> type *.tmp  ->find now->select all ->delete.
• Uninstall all the unnecessary software's, outdated demo versions. buggy alpha ,beta ,trial wares  and free up the system.
• Frequent installation and un installation of  software's leave their own Waste files in C:\ program files folder and also make the registry grow.  Always uninstall through Start ->settings ->control panel->Add/Remove programs.
  Some software's has its own un installation programs,  in that case  uninstall through such uninstallers.
  Remove the remnants of uninstalled programs in C:\ program folder , and expired short cuts in desk top and start menu
• Use a good registry cleaning software to remove all obsolete keys that  will help the system boot little fast.
• Before You make any changes in the registry it's very important to take a registry backup.
  To do this Start->run-> (type )regedit->registry->Export registry files.
• Try to make complete system backup. When your system faces disaster, It will help to restore your system as before. You may use Symantec Ghost  or similar software's.
• Remove the Unnecessary programs at startup Except  fire wall and Antivirus program. To do this go to Start->programs->startup. remove  unwanted programs listed there. Such programs may contain spy wares. They consume a lot of your system resources and make your internet busy and  slowdown your system. Some programs automatically dial your ISP (Internet Service Provider) and make your internet bill high.

Install Antivirus Programs

• There is lot of Viruses and malicious codes are floating around the web  It is important to install a good Antivirus software in your computer, and it must be updated  at least every weak. Otherwise it is useless, and often scan your  system completely. No need of more than one Antivirus software, and firewalls which may slow down data process    Don't open any mail from unknown or suspected source. And don't download and execute any  .exe files from  unknown source. Use filters in your mail box to filter unwanted spams and junk mails. Even you don't need to download just browsing some sites may infect your computer. Some programs may hidden in the web pages, word  documents ,and inside some pictures. To reduce the risk of infection any things  you downloaded must be scanned with a  Updated Anti virus programs. Lot of sites uses cookies, batch files, script files, spy wares  in their web pages and download it in your computer without your knowledge. They collect necessary information and send to their sites. They can change Your computer settings, modify registry values, display their ads frequently. Steals Passwords, other personal data's. Then Your computer no more a personal computer. Somebody  can  watch ,and control Your computer  from a remote location. :(
• Before opening any floppies and  CDR, CDRW  disks in your drive that you just copied any program from other computer, Select the drive  right click  scan for virus. 
• Install one good software to find out and remove such unwanted nasty programs. If you use one such software then you realize how many ugly insects hidden  inside  your PC. Remove all  that 

• Install one good fire wall like zone alarm to check incoming outgoing information from your computer to internet or other  computers in the network

• Worms and viruses  can easily spread through networks. Disconnect all  infected computer from the network
• Apply all the updates and patches to your operating system. So you can block most of the holes that hackers and virus usually uses.
• If you are frequently delete , paste ,cut ,and replace big files ,do a  complete defragmentation of your entire hard disk at least monthly once . This will change the location of most used  files to easily accessible. and minimize  the back and forth hard disk spinning.
• If there is any minor problems and error message displayed. before you call the technician  simply shut down the computer wait restart .Mostly the problem  disappears. 
• Most of the file corruption file missing problems occur due to unexpected power termination, unexpected restart ,memory problems, bad sectors in hard disk low hard disk space, cross linked files. Try  thorough scandisk check in safe mode. To do this press F8 while the system boot process .Boot menu appears. Select safe mode->ok->start ->programs -> accessories -> system tools->scandisk-> check Through->select drive ->start.
• When a program hangs or the mouse stops working press Ctrl +Alt +Del  once at the same time. Check at the window which program  is not responding .End task that program. windows may became normal.
• Playing Old ,scratched CD's ,Buggy software's may cause the windows hang .Avoid that.

Your health

•  Continuously stick your eyes on the bright screen of monitor slowly and definitely damage the retina of your eyes. So take extreme care about you eyes. often give some relaxation. If your  job is always in front of monitors adjust Brightness, contrast ,and color of the monitor for a pleasant display. In the night better put on room light  when using computer to reduce eye strain.  Use Good quality Filter glass to filter most of the harmful radiation from the monitor. Besides visible light monitor may radiate  many invisible rays as well as X-rays. Don't  get  exposure for a long time continuously.
• comfortable table ,chair , atmosphere. and good mood are important for working with computers. Impatient  and emotional upset may destroy your system, specially keyboards.
•  Do not use computers  in dining tables and in bedrooms -not good for health ;)

Links

Microsoft--         About Windows operating system

Intel        --          About Intel motherboard

Norton Antivirus-Antivirus program

McAfee    ---       Antivirus program

Ad aware----        Remove Ad ware's from your Computer

Spybot  ----          Remove Spy wares from your Computer

Virus Hoax---      Truth about computer  security hysteria