Caring for Your Computer Equipment

By Ed Dalton

It is important to protect your computer equipment from extremes of temperature and humidity, and to keep it in a relatively dust-free environment.

Notice where the air vents are, and make sure that you do not locate other equipment or objects where they will interfere with the free flow of air in and out of your computer.

Although a computer may be rated to operate over a fairly wide range of temperatures, devices such as disk drives are subject to expansion and contraction with temperature. It is best to operate the computer within a range of plus or minus five degrees Fahrenheit relative to its normal ambient temperature.

Let the computer warm up for five minutes after turning it on, before installing any software or saving any important data or documents.

Laptop computers are designed to be hardier than desktops, but that doesn't mean that you can knock them around. Treat your laptop as gently as possible. Never leave your laptop in a car on a hot day, or in any other environment where it could get unusually hot, cold, or damp.

If you bring the laptop indoors after being out in the heat or cold, let it come to room temperature before trying to use it.

Protect your removable storage media in order not to risk losing valuable data. Keep any magnetic media (Zip disks, and so on) away from magnetic fields of any kind. Never use a paper clip to attach a diskette to a paper document.

CD-ROM disks are relatively hardy, but you should keep them in their holders to protect them from dust, and never let them be bent.

The preceding material was written by Ed Dalton. These are the opinions of the author, not the opinions of eBay, and therefore eBay does not validate the accuracy of or endorse these opinions.