LAPTOP TIPS

LAPTOP MAINTENANCE TIPS


Laptops are expensive gadgets made for mobility. Generally, they are not very tough, and are not known to take too well to being mishandled. If you do end up messing your laptop, even the smallest of repairs will set you back by thousands of rupees. Read on to learn how to care for your laptop. We have also included some important pointers you need to stick to before, during and after using your laptop.

Clean It Right
Since your laptop is such an expensive gadget (falling prices notwithstanding), be extremely careful while cleaning the screen. Make sure the cloth is very soft, and has no imprints or monograms on it, as these may scratch the screen. Also ensure that the cloth is lint-free, else it will leave fibres on the screen, and make the display unclear. Make sure you don't spray any cleaner directly on the screen. Instead, spray onto the cleaning cloth, and allow the cloth to capture the dirt and contaminants.

Choosing The Spray
The screen is the most expensive component of your laptop. Adequate care must be taken while choosing the cleaning spray. Harsh sprays could turn the screen yellow, and may even cause cracking. Use plain water or vinegar to clean the screen.

Placing The Laptop
Hard drives work on the property of magnetic flux, so any electrical field may damage the hard disk and the data on it. Make sure your laptop is at least 13 cm away from any electrical appliance that generates a strong magnetic field-such as a microwave oven.

Give It A Breather
If you have just shut down your laptop, give it 30 seconds before you start it up again. This ensures that the hard drive has spun down, and is not subjected to sudden switching on and off.

Data Backup
Always back up your data. Laptops are mobile devices, and are susceptible to breakage. Also, it's possible that the hard disk simply crashes. Remember, you can never back up too frequently.

Laptop Battery Care
The bane of most laptop users is the lack of a really long battery life. There are three main types of laptop batteries:
Nickel-Cadmium (Ni-Cd)
Nickel Metal Hydride (Ni-MH)
Lithium Ion (Li-ion).
Nickel-Cadmium
This type of battery must be fully discharged and then fully recharged every few weeks. If you don’t do this, it will quickly lose battery life due to what is known as the `memory effect'.
The memory effect means if you don't follow the above procedure, your battery will only charge up to the percentage of the last charge. For instance, if you discharge it to 30 per cent, it will only charge up the remaining 70 per cent. Do this repeatedly, and the 30 per cent will become unusable, giving you an effective 70 percent charge even though the indicator will still show a 100 per cent charge each time you charge it.
Nickel Metal Hydride
Ni-MH batteries are similar to Ni-Cd batteries, although they are less susceptible to the memory effect. They also have a higher capacity.
Lithium Ion
These are the latest type of batteries, and have no real problems as far as the memory effect is concerned. The problem with these is that they lose their effectiveness if overcharged or ­left for a long time with a full charge. Always discharge these batteries if you're going to be storing them away.

Keep Your Battery Healthy
Before the first use, charge the batteries for 12 hours or the minimum charge time, as mentioned in the manual.
For daily use, charge the battery to capacity, then run the laptop on battery power until it is completely drained (for Ni-Cd or Ni-MH batteries, this prevents the memory effect) or almost drained. (For Li-ion batteries, this can help prevent overcharging).
Don't leave your battery unused for long periods of time. Even if you use AC power most of the time, use the battery regularly to keep it in good condition. Switch off your AC adapter when the laptop is not in use. This prevents overcharging.
To extend battery life, you can try decreasing the LCD brightness while using your notebook. You can activate the `Standby' and `Hibernation' power­saving modes, too, for better battery life.

Battery Storage
If you do not use your laptop for extended periods of time-a week or more ­remove the battery pack from the laptop, but only after discharging it fully.
The batteries should be stored in a cool dry place, removed from heat, humidity and dust as well as metal objects.

Use A Laptop Case
It is advisable to spend a couple of thousand rupees and get a sturdy carry-case for your laptop.The case should ideally be hard from the outside and soft on the inside, while being a comfortable fit. It should be able to absorb shocks and carry your laptop accessories.

Keep Eatables Away
Obviously, no eating and drink­ing near or around your laptop. The least bit of water could short-circuit some sensitive laptop circuits, and render it useless.

No Hard Booting
You may sometimes be tempted to turn your laptop off by simply holding down the power button until it powers down. Although quick, this method is harmful to the laptop and could cause data loss.A hard reboot should only be used as a last resort. Sometimes this is inevitable, for instance, when Windows hangs. But this should not be a regular practice.

General Tips
Shortcuts To Success
Create shortcuts to your most commonly used applica­tions, folders and files on the desktop. This way, you can access them quickly. If you like your desktop clutter-free, you can also create custom toolbars in Windows XP.To do this, right-click on the Windows taskbar, go to `Toolbars' and click `New Toolbar'. Next, choose the drive or folder you want to access using the toolbar. You can create different toolbars for different drives and folders.This is expecially useful for sales executives who want easy access to presentations, pro and other information they use on a day-to-day basis.
Clean up The Junk
Uninstall applications you don't use. Apart from saving on disk space, you'll also prevent your notebook from slowing down.Be resourceful-keep backups of the OS, drivers and commonly used applications on a secondary partition so you can do some re­installing on your own if you face any issues when travelling. Carry driver CDs and recovery disks.

Laptop Security
Don't Be A Jerk
Don't subject your laptop to jerks and shocks. This will help avoid damage to your hard drive.Preferably, power the notebook off before moving it from one place to another.
Dusty Notebooks Don't Impress
Protect your laptop from dust. Ensure vents are clean to enable good air flow.
Drinks And Laptops A No-No
Don't place any containers filled with beverages (hot or cold) near your notebook, to prevent accidental spills.

Power Saving Tips
Let Power Be Managed By The Pros
Set the device to switch off the LCD screen, and hard drive after fixed intervals of time.
Disconnect
External peripherals and accessories such as external opti­cal drives, PC cards and USB keyboard lights draw power from the notebook. Disconnect such devices when not in use.
Suspend Your Notebook
Booting the notebook when it is not connected to a power source draws a lot of power from the battery. Instead of shutting down your laptop in the middle of a meeting, choose the `Suspend' mode if you wish to use it again after just a short interval. This will save battery and help you restart your work faster

These weekly laptop maintenance tips will help you keep your data protected and safe while on the road. Companies with mobile professionals should consider making these tips part of their mobile work policies and check periodically that their mobile professionals are completing these maintenance tasks. For those who frequent hot spots, this is especially important. It takes only one mobile professional to be lax in their maintenance for a company to risk losing important data.
Anti-Virus Updates
Checking for virus’ on your laptop is probably the most important weekly maintenance task you should do. Even if you forget or don’t have time to do the rest – keep your anti-virus software up to date. Whether you are using a free or paid anti-virus program, you have to keep that program up to date in order for it to be effective. I normally run my anti-virus updates each Monday morning.

Just as you keep your anti-virus software up to date, you must also keep your firewall program up to date. Gone are the days when dial-up access users were safe from intrusions. Remember with your laptop that you are not only protecting personal data but corporate information as well. Mobile professionals may face more opportunities for unauthorized access just by virtue of the nature of their work; make sure you don’t become an easy target.

Back Up Data and Email
Backing-up your data and email on a weekly basis will help you ensure another layer of protection. There are plenty of external storage solutions which you can use to keep your information safe. If you lose your laptop or suffer a hard drive crash, knowing that you have a back-up made will make your working life much easier. I've heard countless tales of lost data and emails that were important and not recoverable. Save yourself the frustration by doing a weekly back-up.
Last Christmas Santa may have gifted you a new laptop or some laptop accessories, but most probably he did not tell you how to take care of it. So you need to have some top five laptop maintenance tips developed in your mind before you get yourself into trouble. Here are some of the top five laptop maintenance tips to keep your laptop running smoothly: One of the top five laptop maintenance tips is that you should never ever turn your laptop off with the power switch until windows has completely shut down. The only exception to this is when your laptop gets hanged and your hard drive is not running smoothly. If this is the situation, you can turn the power off without causing any harm to the hard drive. You should remember that cutting the power can also result in loss of data or windows files which can land you in trouble. You should remember that laptops are expensive gadgets facilitating the mobile users. Generally, they are very delicate so you just cannot mishandle them. If you end up messing your laptop, even the minutest of repairs will burn a big hole in your pocket by the excessive cash that you will end up spending. Secondly, since your laptop is one of the expensive gadgets that you possess, be extremely careful while cleaning the screen. Ensure that the cloth you are using is a soft one, and has no imprints or monograms on it, as these may scratch the screen. Also make sure that you are using lint-free cloth, else it will end up leaving fibres on the screen, and make the display not visible. Please be sure that you do not clean with a spray by directly pouring it on the screen .You should always spray onto the cleaning cloth then allow the cloth to wipe off the dirt and contaminants of the screen. This is one of the top five laptop maintenance tips. One of the top five laptop maintenance tips is also to ensure that you place your laptop properly. The Hard drives has the property of magnetic flux, so any electrical field may damage the hard disk and the data on it.
Always make sure that your laptop is at least at a distance of 13 cm away from any electrical appliance that generates a strong magnetic field for example the microwave oven. Fourthly if you need to shut down your laptop, then give it at least 30 seconds before you start it up again. This will ensure that the hard drive has spun down, and is not subjected to sudden switching on and off. The last but not the least the top five laptop maintenance tips is to always back up your data. The Laptops are mobile devices, and are susceptible to breakage. There is also a possibility that the hard disk simply crashes. Just remember you can never back up too frequently.

You must also take care of laptop batteries .You must go for batteries which have long lives. There are three main types of laptop batteries like Nickel-Cadmium (Ni-Cd),Nickel Metal Hydride (Ni-MH),Lithium Ion (Li-ion) and Nickel-Cadmium. The batteries must be fully discharged and then fully recharged every few weeks. This gives a long life to the batteries due to the “memory effect”. The memory effect means your battery will only charge up to the percentage of the last charge. You should also remember that you should not eat nor drink near or around your laptop. Even a bit of water could be the cause of short-circuit. You may sometimes turn your laptop off by simply holding down the power button until it powers down. Though this is a quick method it is quite harmful for your laptop and can cause data loss. A hard reboot should only be used as a last resort. Always remember that downloading software and screen savers often create conflicts and use valuable memory. Laptop is a great mobile tool for accomplishing your task in an efficient manner and keeping it free of extras will let it work quicker with less of freezing. These are some of the laptop maintenance tips

Laptops are the small sized computers that are found to be portable. The usefulness of the laptops is felt in the contemporary age which is marked by the massive expansion of the information technology. The laptops are really expensive. Thus, the laptops need good care. Cleaning laptop is the primary requisite to keep the laptops in proper condition. As far as Cleaning Laptop is concerned, certain steps have to be followed in order to keep the computers clean. Certain things are needed for cleaning laptop. These things include cotton swabs, Compressed Air, soft cloth and a mixture of vinegar and water. Instead of the mixture of water and vinegar, you can also use laptop cleaning solutions. The blend of vinegar and water has proved to be extremely useful in cleaning laptop.
Before the cleaning of laptop, it is always recommended to read thorough the manual. It is by going through the manual that you will be able to know a lot regarding the cleaning of laptop. The use of harsh cleaning substances is thoroughly discouraged while making the laptop clean. Cleaning agents containing ammonia also should not be used to clean the laptops. Take proper care to eliminate the dirt that gets stuck in the inner portion of the laptops. Because these dirt and dust particles are often found to hinder the proper functioning of the fans inside the laptop. In order to clean the casing of the laptops, you can also make use of the damp cotton. But make sure that the cotton you use in cleaning the laptop casing is soft.

The compressed air is required for cleaning the cooling vents. After cleaning the vents, it is required to clean the I/O Ports. The cotton swabs are used to remove the large fragments of dirt gets accumulated in the laptop. One should always remain cautious that the dirt does not enter into the I/O Ports. There are certain other points that have to be thoroughly kept in mind while cleaning laptop. It is really needed to turn off the laptop before you start cleaning the laptop. Paper towels must not be used to while cleaning laptops. As a solution for cleaning laptops, you may also make use a mixture of water and alcohol. Ammonia based cleaning solutions are not to be used for the purpose of cleaning the laptops. Clean your laptop and ensure its longevity.
Laptop is a small mobile computer, which weights about 2-18 pounds or 1 to 6 kilograms depending on size, material and others factors. A laptop computer is smaller than a desktop. It has been unanimously accepted that the most significant advantage of a laptop over a desktop is that it is portable. But against this advatage there are a number of laptop disadvantages also. The first that heads the list is that it is expensive than a desktop. It is also slower than a desktop. Moreover, it cannot be upgraded as much as a desktop can. There are also certain other disadvantages like it quickly gets heated and the lifespan is relatively shorter. So against the more overwhelming advantage of being portable, it suffers from a bunch of laptop disadvantages also.Again it has been reported that one of the prime laptop disadvantages is the fact that it has a smaller disk storage than a desktop. The maximum disk storage of a laptop now is 120 GB.


Another important diadvantage is that it lasts for only 2 to 3 years if it is a good make and is used under average treatment. Laptops are generally more fragile than desktops. Even the life span of laptops is shorter than that of normal desktops. But the prime disadvantage of a laptop that is creating health hazards is that it is creating worse ergonomics, as the keyboard and the screen in not in the best place for wrists and eyes. So there a number of disadvantages to counter the single most advantage of a laptop. But the laptop proves to be a boon for the business travelers as they have to travel most of the time and also needs to carry the entire data with them.
Miscellaneous Laptop Facts

Planning to buy a laptop? Then you need to know about some of the miscellaneous laptop facts. Laptops have replaced the desktop computers and have gained ample popularity over the PCs by offering a number of advantages to its users. The most important advantage of laptop is its portability. You can carry your laptop to your office and can use it in your home. The portability factor has become a requirement for every individual. One major drawback of laptops is that it can not be easily upgraded. It is the main hindrance of buying a laptop. Technical as well as economic reasons make its upgradeability limited. The basic facts that you need to keep in mind while purchasing any laptop are its price, screen size, storage capacity, battery longevity and wireless connectivity. Read on to gather detailed idea on miscellaneous laptop facts. Important facts about laptops:
A laptop normally weighs between 2-18 pounds. The weight depends on on the size, material and on its specifications.
It functions with the help of a single battery. You can also use the AC or DC adepter to charge its battery.
A laptop features certain basic parts. It has a 12 inch display screen with a minimum resolutions of 1024X768 pixels. The internal hard disks of a laptop is usually 2.5 inches.
 High end laptop models such as Dell Inspiron E1705 and E1505 offer graphics processor. The processor used in a laptop are offered by Intel. It include Celeron, Intel Core, Intel Core 2 and Pentium M. Other companies, which offer laptop processors are VIA Technologies and Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
 The touch pad or the pointing stick helps to control the cursor on the screen. The touch pad is very sensitive and you can navigate the cursor by using your finger. Pointing stick is another option. You can also use the optical mouse to navigate your cursor.
 The nickel metal hydride technology has been replaced by lithium ion. The current laptop models use lithium polymer batteries.

Laptop accessories:The accessories which are available with a laptop include DVD and CD writer, printer, pen drive, carry case, headset, data card, webcam, speakers, . All these products can be bought separately. Companies offering Laptops:The prominent laptop manufacturing companies are IBM, Sony Vaio, Apple, Lenovo, Toshiba, Compaq, Samsung, Acer laptop and HCL. All these companies offer warranty for at least one year to the customers. Some companies such as Intel, Quanta, Asus and Compal Electronics have created a standard for all the laptop parts. Many companies offer you the option to buy laptops in installments. For further information about Miscellaneous Laptop Facts refer to our website laptopxl.com
Things to Remember Before Buying a Laptop Bag

Your laptop is a computing device, which makes most important tasks in your life easy and comfortable. Moreover, since this electronic device is a sensitive item, it needs to be protected from outer dangers. In order to secure laptops, the laptop bags are used that protects it from scratch and other hard substances. There are certain things to remember before buying a laptop bag. As the safety of a laptop is related to its bag, hence, you must assure that these bags are soft and waterproof. Today, laptops have become most important things just after the mobile phones. Therefore, laptop bags, like mobile cases have become some of the major aspects of fashion statement. Users of laptop bags range from students to the retired people. Hence, the patterns and styles of the laptop bags are not same for all. It is highly depended upon an individual’s choice. Hence, there are certain things to remember before you buy a laptop bag. A bag must have all the provisions to carry those items as well. So, everything needs to be judged according to your requirements.
Durability of the laptop bag is the most important feature, which needs to be judged. There are different materials used for these bags. Being waterproof is of utmost importance. This is because all the electronic gadgets are subjects to be harmed when exposed to water. Yet another thing that should be considered is the size of the laptop bag. This is reason that you should always measure the bag according to the size of your machine. You should ensure that the bag does not exert pressure on the laptop's surface. Weight of the laptop bag is also an important thing to be judged.

The anti-theft laptop bags are some of the most required ones throughout the world. Some of the known models in this field are Meshsafe m 100, Meshsafe m 200, Daysafe 200, Couriersafe 100, Commutasafe 100, and likewise. Some bags have alarming systems as well, which ensures further safety. The locks are made in such a way that no one will be able to open it except the owner.
Laptop Battery Basics

A laptop computer is a small mobile computer which usually weighs around 2-18 pounds, depending on size, materials, and several other factors. To take proper care of your computer ensures that the battery is safe and is ready to work when it is required urgently. Following the laptop battery basics or the tips the things to consider include the following:
Avoid extreme temperatures
Don’t leave a laptop outside in cold weather
Do not leave it inside a hot car
The cold batteries fail to create power while the hot batteries easily discharge. One must always use electrical power to keep the battery charged if available. You can also use electrical power for charging the batteries. Try to use the battery quite often and do not let your laptop go for long periods of time without using the battery. Following the laptop battery basics it is good to follow certain safety options: The smaller models are always handy. Hence, instead of going for a desktop replacement option, try to consider an ultraportable or thin-and-light laptop model. Usually the display of a smaller laptop uses less power. In smaller versions you can also opt for a hard drive that runs at 4200rpm and uses less power than a hard drive running at 5400rpm.
Before using the laptop turn down the lights and adjust the brightness a bit low. However, ensure that you can comfortably view the screen without putting pressure on your eyes. The color brightness can also be adjusted to suit the conditions of working. Power control is also one important laptop battery basics. Use less power by adjusting the laptop settings. Keep on using the power options to make the computer stop oeprating after a set amount of time. Properly set the adjustments so that at first the display goes off, then the hard drive stays active a bit longer and stores the system content’s into the RAM.

Always keep note on your battery consumption and also have the idea that how much power is left. For this you can use the battery power icon on the system tray or you can also buy batteries with little LED gauges on the outside of the battery itself. The battery should continuously be charged whenever you have access to a power source. If you are going for a long journey try to fully charge the battery especially if you don’t know where or when you might have access to any electrical outlets. Several other important laptop battery basics include the following important tips:
Get another Battery
Drain the Battery
Clean Batteries ­