Software Vault: The Gold Collection/Software Vault - The Gold Collection (American Databankers) (1993).ISO/cdr11/onr5_93.zip/E

Text File | 1993-06-10 | 9KB | 195 lines

                     PC MAINTENANCE LAB
                       Copyright 1993
                         Dave Laird

                  It's Coming on Summer...

Has it been more than four months since you  opened up the case
to your personal computer and looked inside? Does the muffin fan
in your PC power supply sound like an old-time coffee percolator?
Is your hard drive hot enough to cook an order of bacon and eggs?

If answers to any of the above questions are YES, it is time for
you to perform the annual Spring Thing--PC maintenance for your
power supply.

                THINGS YOU WILL NEED TO BUY:

Nearly any electronics supply house sells cans of compressed air.
They resemble cans of Freon such as you would buy to recharge
automotive air conditioning, and contain no water vapor to
disturb your valuable components. Purchase one for each PC that
needs servicing.

If you do not already own one, purchase a wrist grounding strap.
If you have never used one, at first you may have difficulty
finding one of these invaluable units. It looks like a
plastic/nylon wrist strap with a wire attached. Fasten the
alligator clip at the terminus of the wire to a good ground, such
as a radiator or water pipe. Then, when you slip on the wrist
strap, you are grounded, thus eliminating any chances of static
discharge, which could annihilate your PC motherboard or its
components.

If you don't already have one, get a diskette drive cleaning kit
from your local friendly PC store.

                    TOOLS YOU WILL NEED

One of the beauties of PC maintenance is that it takes very few
special service tools to perform routine maintenance, despite
what the spendy advertisements in the back of PC Magazine say to
the contrary. Generally speaking, all you need for routine
maintenance of your PC is a good phillips and a good flat
screwdriver, a one-quarter inch socket set (preferably metric)
with drivers,  a pair of needle-nosed pliers, a magnifying glass
(especially if you have aging eyes.) and a good work light.

                THE PROCEDURE(S) TO FOLLOW:

First, put on the new wrist strap, making certain that the
alligator clip is firmly fastened to a good ground. Do it BEFORE
you ever turn your PC off. STATIC ELECTRICITY KILLS computers.

Never opened up your PC before? Don't panic now. It's fairly
simple. It makes no difference whether your PC is built into a
tower, a mini-tower, an AT or a modified baby AT case, the screws
are on the back. Turn your computer off, making certain if it is
of a type that needs it, to park the hard disk drive(s).
Carefully remove the various peripheral cables (monitor, mouse,
scanner, modem, printer, soundblaster cables, etc.) from the back
of your computer. If you are worried about remembering where
everything went, take the time to draw yourself a road map of
where everything goes.

Disconnect the power cable from your PC where it goes into the
power supply at the rear. You might want to note the four to six
screws that are right nearby the power cord, as you will be
eventually removing them, as well.

Then, with your PC unemcumbered by cables or lines, turn it
around to where you are facing the rear of the case. If you put
your hands on the top left and top right of the case before you,
look immediately beneath your hands and you should see a row of
screws that go either across or down the side(s) of the case,
depending upon what type of case you have. These screws typically
have both a 8 millimeter hex head and a recessed phillips head.

Take your screwdriver and remove each of the screws, either
across the top or down the sides. My rule of thumb is to try the
phillips head first. If I can't budge the screw, reach for the
socket set, rather than strip the screw face. Remember that the
screws you initially want to remove will always be along the
outside edges of your computer case.

Put these screws in one pile, as they are case screws, and they
are harder than hen's teeth to replace unless you build a lot of
computer cases. Then, gently bump the outermost edges of the case
from the rear with your hands. If the case doesn't seem to want
to separate, make certain you have all the screws out. DO NOT use
a hammer, a screwdriver or other implement of destruction to
loosen the case. In most cases, you have forgotten to remove one
last screw, and what you will do is warp the case to where it
never fits right again.

Got the case loose? GOOD! GENTLY, carefully remove the case
exterior shell and put it off to one side. It will probably
require dusting. Perhaps it is a good time to dig out some 409 or
other mild household cleaner and do the outside of the case while
you are peering inside your PC.

OK, OK, you've sat there long enough gazing at the innards of
your PC. It's time to get back to the serious work at hand.

You may have to loosen any hard disk drives inside the case to
perform the following maintenance. If you are uncertain how to do
this, refer to either the owner's manual or the booklet(s) that
came with your hard disk. You need to get access to the front and
both sides of the hard disk in order to better blow the four
month accumulation of dust, dead bugs or any other debris that
may have accumulated. Be generous with the air.

Then, blow out any diskette drives, first from the inside of the
case, clearing any dust that may have accumulated atop the drives
inside the case. Then, reaching around the front of your
computer, GENTLY blow some air into the front of the diskette
drives themselves.  You will need to come back to them later, so
remove the dust now.

Now, we clean the power supply. It is the large (typically
square) shiny metal box with a series of wires coming out of it
at the top right of the inside of your computer.

Actually, the only part of the power supply that we, as novices,
should ever be interested in, is the fan. There must be air
flowing through the front of the case, in the back of the power
supply inside the case, and out the back of the case. If this is
not happening, the chances are components will overheat, and
perhaps even fail.

GENTLY hold any cabling or wiring out of the way and apply a
full-force blast of compressed air to the little vents on the
power supply, both from the inside and outside. Continue
alternating between the outside (exhaust) vents and the inside
(intake) vents until no more dust is being disturbed.

The next objective is to eliminate dust from the surface(s) of
the chips, the motherboard and the accessory cards that are built
into your PC, ALL WITHOUT TOUCHING THEM. Even with a wrist strap,
it is entirely possible to zap a chip, so you do not want to be
touching any chips on the motherboard. Take your can of air and
carefully spray the motherboard down, and try to keep the dust
(if any) blowing away from you. A sneeze right now could ruin
your entire day.

If you have a tower or mini-tower case, the chances are that
there is a space at the bottom of the case that will also have an
abundance of dust. If you can blow this open area out with your
canned air, without coming into contact with any components or
cards, do so. Otherwise, leave it alone, as dust in this area
generally doesn't go anywhere, anyway.

It's time for you to pour yourself a cup of Starbuck's Best (if
you are really into coffee) and contemplate the changes that you
have effected to your PC. You have eliminated the dust that was
gathering on the chips and components of your motherboard, thus
insuring that they will run cooler during the long, hot summer
months.

Furthermore, you have removed the dust which would prevent your
power supply's cooling fan from circulating air throughout the
interior of your case, and thus prevented overheating of valuable
components from taking place.

Reassemble everything, paying close attention to the case screws.
You need to decide whether or not you wish to be certain that no
one, not even you, will easily loosen the case screws again. If
such is the case, use a four-foot long breaker bar and an eight
millimeter socket to tighten the case screws back down. If not,
if you feel that in four more months, you may wish to repeat
today's performance, tighten the case screws judiciously, using a
common phillips head screwdriver.

Take the new disk drive cleaning kit you purchased, and following
the directions, clean your diskette drives. Since most, if not
all, the diskette cleaning systems available on the market
require a moistening agent to effectively clean the diskette
drive heads, pour yourself another cup of coffee. By the time you
have savored its last dregs, your diskette drives will have
completely dried out from their cleaning.

Plug in all the peripheral devices you disconnected at the
beginning, and when everything is restored to its proper place,
turn on your computer. You forgot to plug it in, right? Yes, by
all means, plug the computer back into the wall. Put your wrist
strap, the screw driver(s), sockets (if any) and your remaining
canned air in a safe place and label it "PC Maintenance".

You can now rejoin the brotherhood of electronic warriors,
process a few words or just return to work, knowing that you have
done what must be done.


Dave