What’s are the most common problems and dangers to your Laptop?
You! Dropping it. Slamming the lid. Grabbing it by the screen. Spilling things on it. Sitting it on the couch or bed or blanket which covers the fan ports. Treat your laptop kindly and don’t let it get overheated. (Heat will slow your computer down, btw).
Lightning and Power Surges. You won’t believe this until it happens to you. When in use, it’s wise to keep your laptop (or PC) connected to a power surge protector (and not a plain powerstrip). When not in use, unplug your laptop. For PCs, invest in a battery backup from ABS (the kind found in every office store). Not only will they save your bacon, their log reports and reminders will make you aware of just how variable your local power supply really is.
Viruses and Malware. Make sure you a good antivirus/malware program and keep it up to date. These days, surfing the net, downloading files and reading email without good protection is like driving a car without brakes.
What’s the most commonly reported computer problem?
“Computer Running Slow“
It can be caused by:
Virus, Malware, Adware.
Make sure you a good antivirus/malware program and keep it up to date.
Low RAM
Adding RAM is the single best thing you can do to improve the performance of your computer after you have cleaned the harddrive.
Not enough free space on your harddrive
My daughter’s 1 year old laptop started running slow. Why? Because she had it loaded up with music and photos from her camera when left the harddrive with less than 10% free space. The harddrive uses free space to unfold programs and create virtual memory.
Easy Solutions in order of “what to do first”:
- Update and/or install good antivirus/malware software (such as AVG Free) and run a scan on your computer immediately.
- Remove unwanted programs using the Control Panel’s Uninstall Menu.
- Move photos and unwanted music off the harddrive and on to DVDs.
- Look at the number of programs “running in the background” you may have enabled or allowed to be installed. For example, you may have multiple toolbars on your browser that are slowing you down. Uninstall unwanted add-ons using your Control Panel’s uninstall programs feature.
- Run Disk Defragment and Disk Cleanup (both are found in your computer’s admin tools)
- Type the word “ram” in your computer’s search box (Vista and Windows 7) to see how much is on your system. If your system has less than 1 gigabyte, it’s too low. Vista and W7 need a minimum of 2 gb of RAM to function nicely.
Last but not least… BACKUP BACKUP BACKUP
Your computer WILL EVENTUALLY blow-up.
Backup Solutions:
Vista and Windows 7 have automatic backup software built into them. They can be set to prompt you to backup your files. They know to back up email software and your document folders. They can be told to back up anything else.
Mozy.com. An online backup service that costs less than $10 a month (which you’d gladly pay in hindsight when your harddrive crashes and you didn’t have your files backed up). You download a small file from Mozy, tell it what files you want to back up, and it turns itself on and sends your files to a safe online location at regular intervals. Very easy to use.
Set regular reminders in your email program. I use the reminder feature in Outlook email all the time to remember things.
Email extra-important files to your spare online email account. Example: when I was travel to preach or present, I email my sermon/docs to my gmail account “just in case”.
I’m not big on backing up the entire harddrive, just the essential files I can’t do without. The trick is to actually DO IT.
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