Computer Maintainence Tips

Maintenance Tips to Prevent Down time.

*What is* *necessary?*		Computers run happily for years without much maintenance. Anything with moving parts, like the power supply fan, CPU fan and HD, will fail someday, so, turn off the computer when it is not in use for two hours or more. The philosophy of smart maintenance is a compromise between, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it", and preventing the CPU cooling fan from clogging up with dust. Clean the CPU fan every 2 years and replace it every 5 years. Use common sense when working inside your computer. Most computer failures are caused by something minor that might have been prevented. Often adequate power, ventilation and a little cleaning of the dust is all that is necessary. What might need attention? What is most important?
*Power*		Neither the power company, nor the weather man plans lightning. Nothing can stop the average 20 million volt direct lightning hit. In storms, turn off all the components AND unplug the outlet strip. Several surge protectors from the power company and on every outlet in the room help prevent damage form distant lightning strikes and surges on the line. Surges are also produced when dropping large inductive (motor) loads such as a washing machine or air-conditioner. Surge protectors can absorb small spikes continuously, or a larger portion of their rated energy only once before becoming ineffective. The actual part that does the protecting is cheap. If you spend over $10 for a surge protector, its the insurance you are paying for. The capacitor like surge protector parts are available at Radio Shack.
*Is the* *Power* *good?*		If light bulbs appear to be too dim or bright, or seem to flicker, have the power company check your voltage. In some cases they may install a recorder to monitor the power. They can tell you if the wiring and outlets are properly grounded. The long round third "ground" prong in an outlet should eventually go to a copper or zinc plated stake in moist soil, not to the cold water pipes. Electric current in pipes causes electrolysis to dissolve metal pipes and joints. Then, poisonous lead is released into your drinking water. Although not a perfect solution, an uninterruptable power supply may give enough time to save and close networked files properly. The power consumed by every item running on this battery operated device must be added into the load. Remember, you may be busy or out to lunch when the power fails and... it will be suddenly dark.
*Take care of* *the Hard Drive*		*Use scandisk, then defrag regularly.* When scandisk finds an error it may seem to hang for up to 10 minutes. It is trying to recover data from the bad sector.
*Get the* *Info on* *Boot Up*		If the silver wafer looking battery ever goes dead in your computer it may "forget" more than just the date and time. On older computers, the CMOS setup could forget what kind of hard drive you have. Even worse, "stuff" that only the "rocket scientist" at the manufacturer knows for sure, is sometimes stored in the CMOS setup. Make a record of the CMOS setup contents for future reference. To do this, boot up, and hold escape key or follow the directions on the screen to start "setup". Once in CMOS setup, most computers will do a "print screen" to print its contents. If not a "print screen", then write down (everything) the number of cylinders, heads, sectors, landing zone and total size of the hard drive is most important. Write it on an index card and tape it to the bottom of the computer for future reference. Exit Setup without saving or unnecessarily changing the information. After a failure, this info can be typed back in setup. On motherboards using Pentium2 MMX and newer, this is not a problem because CMOS has an "auto" HD detect feature, which can be activated in setup to find the actual HD info. Replacement batteries and holders are available at ACK Radio Supply Company in Atlanta. Battery supply stores may also have a replacement.
*One Insurance* *is Backup*		Be prepared for the worst; then it won't happen. Back up is easier than re-installing everything. Especially with "pre loaded" software, MSbackup can be used. Incremental MSbackup can save additional work and changes you don't want lost. Removable drives and CDs can likewise backup several computers. You can drag and drop all your files onto CDRW or use FREE xxcopy to clone whole or a partition of a hard drive.
*Be ready if the Hard Drive gets wiped out.*		Make an Emergency Repair Diskette or a Windows startup diskette. On Win95/98+ to create a startup disk... start button \| control panel \| Add/Remove Programs Properties \| Startup Disk tab \| Click Create Disk. To manually make a boot diskette for older systems, follow the directions below. If the computer won't boot from the hard drive, you will need a "boot diskette". The command in DOS is: "format a: /s". The boot diskette can also have copies of the CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT for convenience. These can be bypassed by pressing F8 on boot up. If disaster strikes your hard drive it will be good to have everything necessary, on diskette, to restore the backup to a new, or newly formatted hard drive. Note* if you have a tape backup, removable drive, or other device, which you are going to restore from. Be sure the drivers for that device are on diskette too. Be sure the path(s) in the Config.sys and Autoexec.bat point to those drivers on the A: drive.
*Besides a boot,* *You need these files on diskette*		The most useful DOS files for restoring (files) a hard drive and Win3.1 contain; SYS.COM; FDISK.EXE; all the MSBACKUP.* files, (except .HLP); CHKDSK.EXE; EXPAND.EXE; FORMAT.COM; UNFORMAT.COM; UNDELETE.EXE; EDIT.COM: QBASIC.EXE; QBASIC.INI; and XCOPY.EXE. Put the SCANDISK utility on a diskette too, it can be run from diskette to fix errors on the hard drive. To get CD-ROM support in DOS or Safe mode you'll need to load MSCDEX.EXE. Either from diskette or by un-rem*arking the lines to load Windows MSCDEX.EXE in the AUTOEXEC.BAT. Practice by typing "edit autoexec.bat" at a dos prompt, and boot up again. Then you can restore bad files from your the CD's you have burned for that purpose or run setup.
*To restore* *everything* *for* *Windows3.1*		Here is the sequence for restoring everything for DOS and Win3.1 after a total "wipe-out" of the hard drive. If the setup information is not correct in the BIOS about the number of Cylinders, Sectors, and Heads on the hard drive, that will have to be added/corrected first. Most computers will do a print screen in the BIOS setup. Save the printout somewhere. Only if absolutely necessary, before formatting the hard drive.... The partition information of the HD can be checked and viewed with FDISK option #4.. Any choice, other than viewing, will require formatting the HD again! Warning this will erase everything on the HD. The undocumented switch, "FDISK /MBR", will write the CMOS boot info to the Hard Drive. This is useful for some viruses which destroy or modify the boot record. Example: AntiCMOS-A. #1. Boot from diskette then put the system files on the HD. #2. Type SYS A: C:. #3. Then type "C:" , now on the C: drive, type MD DOS to make a dos directory. Then type "A:" to return to the A: drive. #4. Copy or XCOPY all the files on the repair diskette to the C:\DOS directory on the 'blank' hard drive. This is because MSbackup cannot be run from diskette. #5. From C:\DOS, start MSBackup and choose restore. Inserting many diskettes will make it so [restored]. Note that some programs will not operate correctly after a restore. One cause of this is that certain combinations of characters could not be properly compressed and uncompressed. Some programs may also have some form of copy protection. Programs may be missing an empty directory, which was not restored.
*Take* *notes*		Before installing new adapter cards in DOS and Win3.1, make notes of how the system is configured. It can save "days" of trial and error work later. Touch the frame before you work inside the computer to drain any static charges. Don't wear bulky sweaters, or walk on a carpet which can hold a static charge. Sweaters can leave fibers in the computer too. Dust can be removed with a vacuum and small paint brush. A bright light, magnifier, and dental mirror might help you see the jumper positions on the mother board and accessory cards without disturbing them. Note the interrupt requests "IRQ's" each device (card) is using. Make notes about the controller card and note it in the manual. Mysterious or intermittent problems with computers are often caused by loose cards, cables and connectors. Many cycles of heating and cooling can make a card "walk" right out of its socket, if it is not secured. If there is a memory problem, it may be safer to take the SIMM memory modules somewhere to be tested. Swapping can bend the little pins that hold and connect them.
*Floppy* *Drives*		Computer fans blow warmed air out from the power supply. Unfortunately fans suck air into the computer through the floppy and CD-ROM drives. Dust will eventually cause them to fail. Clean the fan with a brush and vacuum. The least used floppy drives should be cleaned most often. Diskette and CD-ROM lens cleaning kits are available at many computer stores.
*Make an* *air filter.*		Personally, I am tired of dust accumulating in the computer. There is a way to reduce dust and increase cooling. If you have a vacant drive bay with a cover plate over it. The cover plate can be taken off and replaced with a piece if air conditioning filter material. *A deflector and/or extra fan can send the fresh cool air where it is needed. Besides reducing the dust going through the diskette, and CD-ROM drives, it will increase the overall volume of moving air for cooling.
*Add* *a Fan*		For even better air flow, an extra fan might be added near your "air filter" intake. A little fan on the CPU will keep the CPU cooler, and circulate more air to the other cards and chips in that area. Some fans are more quiet. Bonus, some CPU's will run as much as 5% faster with a fan.
*Monitors*		There is no brand of monitor which cannot burn up. Get an extended warranty. Because of high voltage, monitors do not have user serviceable parts, (other than a fuse). Monitors don't have ventilation fans. Yet many dissipate more heat than their host computer. Keep the slots around the top bottom and sides of the monitor clear of obstruction. Always turn monitors off when not in use or unattended for more than an hour. To prevent chemicals from getting in the monitor and keyboard, spray glass cleaning solution on the paper towel first, then wipe the screen.
*Keyboard*		To clean the keyboard, first hold it upside down and pat all the keys. Do not use harsh chlorine based "grease" cleaners on the keyboard. Barely dampen a cotton cloth or q-tip with a mildly soapy solution, or glass cleaner, before wiping.
*Loose cards* *and cables* *are a common* *cause of* *problems*		Cables, Connectors, & Attachments. Try to maintain a common ground for all the computer attachments. Keep cables from constantly flexing and pulling on their connectors. Lightning can enter from any "wire" such as a cable or an antenna coming from outside the building. Grounded isolation transformers and lightning suppressers are made for most situations where distance cabling is necessary. Surge suppressers on the phone lines may help protect the MODEM. A phone "outlet strip" can be used to unplug the phone lines going into computers during thunderstorms.
*Printers*		Printers with micro processors are becoming more sophisticated. They almost have "a mind of their own". Some are so reliable we forget to look in the manual for good advice about care, oiling and cleaning. Some have undocumented combinations of switch/button pressings so the factory technician can reset 'permanent' errors. Performing these maintenance tips may well be worth it in saving time and trouble later.