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Taking Care Of Your Laptop
Keep liquids away from your laptop. As
tempting as it might be to drink coffee, soda or any other liquid near your
laptop, accidents can happen all too easily. Spilled liquids may damage the
internal components or cause electrical injury to the laptop. Short circuits can
corrupt data or even permanently destroy parts. The solution is very simple:
Keep your drinks away from your computer. Even if you're careful, someone else
might bump into your desk or you.
Keep food away from your laptop. Don't eat over your laptop. The crumbs
can go down between the keys in the keyboard and provide an invitation to small
bugs. The crumbs can also irritate the circuitry. Worse, it makes the laptop
look dirty if there are crumbs and food stains on it.
Always have clean hands when using your laptop. Clean hands make it easier to
use your laptop touchpad and there will be less risk of leaving dirt and other
stains on the computer. In addition, if you clean your hands before use, you
will help reduce wear and tear on the coating of the laptop caused by contact
with sweat and small particles that can act upon the laptop's exterior
underneath your wrists and fingers.
Protect the LCD display monitor. When you shut your laptop, make sure
there are no small items, such as a pencil or small ear-phones, on the keyboard.
These can damage the display screen when shut; the screen will scratch if the
item is rough. Close the lid gently and holding from the middle. Closing the lid
using only one side causes pressure on that hinge, and over time can cause it to
bend and snap.
Hold and lift the computer by its base, not by its LCD display (the screen). If
you lift it by the screen part alone, you could damage the display or the hinges
attaching it to the base. The display is also easily scratched or damaged by
direct pressure – avoid placing pressure on it.
Don't pull on the power cord. Tugging your power cord out from the power
socket rather than putting your hand directly on the plug in the socket and
pulling can break off the plug or damage the power socket. Also, if you have the
power point near your feet, avoid constantly bumping into the plug or you could
loosen it and eventually break it.
Don't roll your chair over the computer cord. Stick the cord onto your desk with
tape or a special computer cord tie which can be easily undone when you've
finished using the laptop. Always try to keep most of the cord away from the
floor or your legs; sometimes you can be so engrossed in what you're doing that
you move your legs and forget the cord is there.
Plug in accessory devices into their proper slots.
Always look at the symbols on the laptop
carefully before inserting devices. Jamming a phone line into an Ethernet
port or vice versa could damage the sockets, making it impossible to use them
again. It is very important to observe this step.
Handle any removable drives with care. Floppy drives or CD drives that have been
removed from your laptop can easily get crushed, dropped or pressed if you are
careless. Put them straight into a bag or a storage box/case for safe keeping if
you are not putting them back into the laptop.
Insert drives into their slots carefully and at the correct angle.
Pushing the wrong drive into a socket, or at an angle, or even upside down can
jam it.
Check to see if labels are affixed securely before inserting media into your
laptop computer. Media such as CDs, DVDs or floppy disks should not have any
loose label parts that might jam inside the laptop drive. Never insert
undersized CDs, as these can damage the disk player permanently.
Don't expose your laptop to rapid temperature fluctuations. When bringing
your laptop indoors during winter, don't turn it on immediately. Instead, let it
warm to room temperature first. This will avoid any potential for damage to the
disk drive from condensation forming inside the machine.
Don't leave your laptop in a car. Not only do the insides of cars
experience large temperature swings that could damage a laptop, but a laptop (or
laptop bag) is an inviting target for a smash and grab thief.
Have the unit cleaned once a year to remove internal dust. Get this done by a
computer professional. If dust accumulates, the system cannot cool itself
correctly. Heat can destroy the motherboard.
Use a properly-sized laptop case. Whatever you use to carry your laptop
around in, be it a case, a bag or something you have made yourself, make sure
that it it large enough to contain the laptop. This will avoid scratching,
squeezing or even potentially dropping it. Look into getting a laptop bag Many
breaks happen because of laptops being dropped or bumped. A bag greatly reduces
the risk of damage.
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