How to Clean your Computer: Software & Hardware Maintenance Guide
The average life of a computer is not more than 5 years but proper maintenance & cleaning of the system will increase the average life span of a PC. Cleaning of the laptop hardware & software is equally important as other maintenance activities. Due to the continuous use of PC in the open space, they will contain a thick layer of dust & other undefined particles. These small dust particles are majorly responsible to decrease the performance of your personal or business computer.
But how to clean your computer is a very general query of the user if they are not much familiar with it. The practice of maintaining a machine clean including hardware and software is known as clean computing. Also, PC cleaning is the most tedious task which you need to perform in a year. You need to clean both hardware (outside the PC) & software (inside the PC). Apart from that, you need to wipe out all fingerprints, dust & other small particles from the PC monitor & keyboard. At the time of cleaning computer software, it includes deleting the unwanted files, videos & images from the PC. By deleting these files you can boost the performance of a laptop.
Importance of cleaning laptop/desktop hardware & software
There are many reasons for this question, like keeping clean the computer hardware will increase the lifespan of your device. That will ultimately save your money and a computer in good condition will run smoothly which will save your time. Whenever you clean your device, you increase its health and performance and reduce the risk of it quickly breaking down.
Sometimes dust and unwanted dirt get deposited because of not being cleaned regularly and this suffocates the PC’s hardware, which in some cases results in overheating. Regularly cleaning your device will help you to protect your system from overheating and causing damage to information stored and internal parts of your device. As we previously told you that regular cleaning will increase the lifespan of your computer.
How do you clean your computer hardware?
Here are some tasks mentioned for the cleaning of laptop & PC which you should add to your list to do after turning off and unplugging your computer:
Weekley dust off your computers by using a soft cloth. A microfiber cloth is best for this purpose. Clean the screen properly, if there are any fingerprints on the screen, you can use liquid cleaners but normal household cleansers can do damage to the screen coating, you can visit a computer store and ask for a screen cleaner specifically designed for your screen type.
To remove tougher smudges, you can dampen your cloth with distilled water, filtered water, or plain water to keep clean your computer hardware. If heavier cleaning is needed then at the place of distilled water using a 50-50 mixture of distilled water and distilled white vinegar to wipe your screen.
After this cleaning process, before turning on your computer make sure that it is dry.
Clean your Keyboard:
The keyboard is one of the most frequently used parts of a computer, it should be kept clean. Turn the keyboard, pat lightly on the backside of your keyboard to remove dust, hairs, dislodge crumbs, etc. use a cotton ball dipped in rubbing alcohol to clean it properly.
To keep the keys to be stuck and avoid falling, do things gently. If your keyboard is acting up you need to deeply clean it. Read the instruction manual that came with the keyboard to open it and clean it deeply.
Blow dust buildup out of computer vents, fans, and accessories:
After a certain time i.e. One or two months, open the exterior case of the computer using a screwdriver. Use a can of compressed air, available at computer shops to remove the dust & other small particles from your desktop.
buildup dust on computer vents, fans, etc. after cleaning, put the case back together. For laptops, you can refer to the instruction manual and do what it says to keep your system dust-free.
Run check disk tools:
To clean your computer, you need to know when there is an issue and how to repair it. Microsoft Windows provides a check disk tool that helps to detect any hard issues before it leads to a big problem. The tool will scan and repair itself. If you haven’t done this before, do it, run a full scan which will enable auto repair and it won’t take much time.
Check surge protectors:
Power surges can sometimes damage the power supply and other components and they could be harmful to computers. Surge protectors can easily lose their protection after just one power surge and if anyhow they are still on they can not provide you the protection you want. So, it’s better to check them after some time intervals and especially before a power surge.
Keep PC ventilated:
Keeping your PC ventilated all the time is very important. Make sure the room is big enough to have good ventilation. There should not be anything around the PC for approx 3 inches of range area. If your pc gets heated early then you need to take care of the CPU fans or even get your CPU fans changed.
How to keep your Computer’s software clean?
Along with computer hardware, computer software also must be clean to work properly. Some tasks to extend the lifespan of your computer are mentioned:
Backup your hard drives:
Backing up your data is a must-do step. Sometimes we need to change our laptop or PC but the information that may be inside the PC is irreplaceable. So if we will have a backup of our data it would be beneficial.
There are two methods by which we can back up our data. One is that we can copy the data at a physical location such as an external hard drive or thumb drive, etc. Another one is that we can store our data in cloud storage or online storage which is very safe and convenient to use.
Get antivirus software:
As it is important to keep our computer dust-free for the proper functioning of the computer, in the same way, it is necessary to keep our device safe from viruses and also to keep our device working properly. One way to get rid of viruses is the use of antivirus software. Antiviruses can help you to clean your computer from the inside. Viruses can be very harmful to computers as they can slow down the computer, erase important data, and even can risk your personal information like they can make your account numbers, pins, passwords, personal data, etc public. So it is better to keep them away from the system.
Keep everything updated:
Always keep your computer up-to-date. Especially those programs which are highly used like adobe flash, chrome, adobe reader, windows, etc. as we know software is updated to keep it away from threats so if we will have outdated software it can be vulnerable to malware. Downloading new updates will make your computer function quickly.
Declutter your software programs:
If you want to clean your computer properly, here is one way. Decluttering keeps computers protected from being blogged by unwanted data. It can also limit the programs that can be hijacked by malware.
Clean your windows registry:
If you use windows, you need to clear your registries. Windows repository keeps details of everything you do on your PC, cleaning it is a good habit. But be careful while cleaning it, because if you took any wrong steps, you will need to reinstall your operating system. And don’t forget to back up your registry, it would be helpful if reinstallation is needed.
Perform a disk cleanup
After some time temporary files are stored on your PC. Temporary files are files that are used to store data that is generated by Windows or by programs that users use. But it was not deleted later automatically when it was not needed. So it takes your system space and slows down the PC. Temporary files are files that are used to store data that is generated by Windows or by programs that users use. You need to delete temporary files to free up storage space. Steps are given below
Type Disk on the search bar, and click on Run as Administrator.
New windows open where you have to check the box for those files you want to delete. Then click OK.
You can also delete temporary files by going to settings. Go to Settings> System> Storage > Hard Disk and select Temporary files.
Conclusion
It is a very healthy habit to clean your computer. Cleaning your computer regularly will increase its lifespan and maintain its efficiency. There are different methods to keep our computer’s hardware clean from dust and dirt clogging. There are various methods for cleaning computer software also. This helps in maintaining the efficiency and performance of the computer. We can also use some clean-up tools like Disk Cleanup Pro Tool, Windows Disk Defragmenter Tool, MacKeeper Tool, etc. these computer cleanup tools help on the software side to keep it clean.
