Motherboard Maintenance

The motherboard of desktop computers is one of the neglected parts when doing computer maintenance. In fact, most of the maintenance tips suggested for desktop computers is focused on software.
A computer's hardware such as the motherboard is likewise a very important area to look into when doing maintenance works. The motherboard houses the vital electronic circuits that keep the desktop computer working. It is here where the computer's microprocessor, the random access memory (RAM), the video card, the sound card, the LAN card, among other removable parts are located.
So what are some important maintenance tips for better motherboard performance thus overall computer efficiency? Here are important things to do and look out for to extend the life of your motherboard:

1. Sweep off dust that builds on the motherboard. Dust build up inside the computer's casing despite it's covering because the power fan or other accessory fans sucks in dirt from outside together with the air used to cool off the insides of the casing. When dust picks up moisture, the sensitive parts may short-circuit and get damaged in the process. Use only a soft paintbrush to clean the motherboard taking care not to brush too hard on small parts. Do this in a well-ventilated area where you can easily dispose of the dust.


Fig. 1. Busted and leaking capacitors.

2. Look for swelling, busted or leaking capacitors. When you notice that some of the resistors appear to be expanded or swelling, this is a cause for alarm. It is a sign of impending failure of the motherboard. Busted or leaking capacitors will stop your desktop computer from working (Fig. 1). This should be replaced with resistors of the same ratings as soon as possible.




 Fig. 2. Motherboard

3. Detach the removable cards (sound card, video card, LAN card, etc.) and clean off the copper connectors with an eraser. Just make sure you have discharge static electricity from your body before doing so. You can do this by placing your hands on a grounded metallic object. Replace the removable parts carefully, avoiding the use of unnecessary force. You should hear these parts click in place.

Fig. 3. Lan Card

4. Check if your CMOS battery is still working. When the stored electrical energy of the CMOS battery (that detachable coin-looking silver thing in the motherboard) is already used up, the date displayed in your desktop computer will be wrong. A failed battery will also prevent your computer from executing some commands which need correct date input such as when logging in to an internet site.

Fig. 4. CMOS battery

5. Check if the fans, especially the fan of your video card, is still working. A non-working video card fan will damage the video card. Ventilation prevents heat build-up in your desktop computer as well the detachable parts. A cool environment will keep your motherboard and its parts working in top condition.

Fig. 5. Video card fan

Regular monthly maintenance of your desktop computer following these 5 motherboard maintenance tips will prevent costly repairs or upgrades.

CTC for you now and future of computer  life

Computer Maintenance

What is it?

If you just use your PC regularly, and have never done any maintenance, you will most likely run into many problems, computer slows down, you get a lot of freezes, files and programs take forever to open.  Windows comes with a set of utilities to aid in the maintenance of your computer.

or

In short and clear; Computer maintenance is the practice of keeping computers in a good state of repair.

Scan Disk

Your Hard Disk Drive (HDD) is used a lot during your computer sessions, a lot of use can result in physical damage to the HDD, as well as other damage such as file fragments becoming lost, unknown or unreadable.  Do a thorough scan disk at least once a month.  Before doing a scan disk, close all programs.

Defragmentation

Ideally, file sectors should be on continuous locations on your hard disk, this means to open a file, the Operating System does not have to do much file processing work.  But when you delete a program, or a file, it leaves a gap; a new file may replace some of this gap, and replace another gap somewhere else.  When this files needs to be opened, more processing, taking much more time is required.  Disk Defragmenter takes this sectors and puts them back together as best as it can, to make the process faster and more efficient.  Do this at least once every two weeks, close ALL programs, ALL internet connections down.  Turn off the screensaver, and don't interact with your pc until complete.   Perform a Scan Disk first.

Msconfig

This utility lets you do various things to check your pc's startup, process what starts up, and how the pc should start up next time, for purposes of tracing errors. 

Disk Cleanup

It's important to keep as much free disk space as possible, a full HDD will run slow, and it will take longer to do the above processes as there are more files to scan.  Virtual Memory requires large amounts of HDD space, if your HDD is full, the space is not available for Virtual Memory.

Temporary/old files
If you plan to do either of the above, do this first.  This looks in common folders were temporary files are stored, which are safe to delete, recycle bin, history, temporary files, temporary internet files etc.  It tells you how many MBs of space the files are taking.  1 GB (HDD are measured in GBs) is 1024MB.  So 500MB of temporary files is almost half a GB.

Utilities/Programs/Applications
You probably install many programs, photo programs, word processors, MP3 players, and games.  Young children are always installing games.  These programs take up huge spaces on HDD, large games can take from 0.5 GBs to 1GB alone.  If you don't use these programs anymore, its worth deleting them, so long as you have the CD, you can put them back at any time.

Document Files
Ever let a child, or have you ever played with paint brush and saved a file to the HDD.  Paint Brush saves files in Bitmap (.bmp) format, this format has NO compression, and creates very large files.  Look in your my documents folder often and delete files which are no longer required, they all free up hard drive space, and could aid in keeping your new computer working new!

Logo's

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How to delete cookies in your Browser ...

Most cookies are easy to delete. Just pick your browser from the choices below and follow the instructions. If your browser isn't listed, please contact us.
You probably have Adobe Local Shared Objects on your computer, also known as LSOs or Flash cookies. Generally you can't delete them with browsers controls, but Adobe's website offers tools to control Flash cookies on your computer. Users of the Firefox browser can also get an add-on to detect and delete Flash cookies.

Windows PC Google Chrome Internet Explorer 8 Internet Explorer 7.x Internet Explorer (all other versions) AOL Mozilla Mozilla Firebird 0.7 Mozilla Firefox Netscape Navigator 7.x Netscape Navigator 6.x Netscape Navigator 4.x Opera Deepnet Explorer 1.1+ Apple Macintosh Internet Explorer 5 (MAC OS X) Internet Explorer 5 (MAC OS 9) Mozilla (Mac) Netscape Navigator 7 (Mac) Netscape Navigator 6 (Mac) Safari 1.0 (MAC OS X) Opera Other WebTV MSNTV2

Windows PC

Google Chrome

Click on the "Tools" menu and select "Options".
Click the "Under the Bonnet" tab, locate the "Privacy" section and click the "Clear browsing data" button.
Select "Delete cookies and other site data" to delete all cookies from the list (alternatively, you can remove all cookies created within a specific time period by selecting the period you want from the dropdown list).
Select "Clear browsing history" to delete traces of which websites you've visited.
Select "Clear download history" to delete records of which files and programs you've downloaded.
Select "Empty the cache" to delete cached website pages.
You can also delete saved passwords (which log you into websites) and saved form data (such as your name and address).
Then click on the "Clear browsing data" button.
Click on the Close button when you've finished.

Internet Explorer 9

Open Internet explorer window
Click the “Tools” button
Point to “safety” and then click “delete browsing history”
Tick the “cookies” box, then click “delete”

Internet Explorer 8

Click "Safety" on the Command bar
Select "Delete Browsing History"
Select the option for cookies and click Delete Alternatively, Internet Explorer 8's new InPrivate browsing feature allows users to browse the internet without recording information from visited sites (including cookies). To use InPrivate mode:
Click "Safety" on the Command bar
Select "InPrivate Browsing"

Internet Explorer 7.x

Exit Internet Explorer 7, and then exit any instances of Windows Explorer
Click Start, click Run, type inetcpl.cpl, and then press ENTER
On the General tab, click Delete under Browsing History in the Internet Properties dialog box
In the Delete Browsing History dialog box, click Delete Cookies
In the Delete Cookies dialog box, click Yes.

Internet Explorer (all other versions)

Internet Explorer saves cookies in more than one location, depending on the version of the browser and the version of Microsoft Windows being used.
The best way to find and delete them is to close Internet Explorer then use your file management software (such as Windows Explorer) and search for a folder called 'cookies'.

AOL 8 and 9

Sign on and select Settings from the toolbar.
Version 9.0 users should select the By Category tab and click the Internet [Web] Options link, while for Version 8.0 and below click Internet Properties (WWW).
Click Settings.
Note: Windows Vista will see more than one Settings button. Click the button in the Browsing history section.
Click View Files. Your list of cookies (plus your other temporary internet files) will be displayed.
If you wish to delete any of the cookies or files, right-click on them and choose Delete.

Mozilla

Choose Cookie Manager from the Tools menu.
Choose Manage Stored Cookies.
Remove any cookie from the list, or remove all cookies.

Mozilla Firebird

Click on Tools, then Options
Select the Privacy icon in the left-hand panel
Click on Cookies
Click on Stored Cookies
To remove a single cookie click on the entry in the list and click on the Remove Cookie button
To remove all cookies click on the Remove All Cookies button

Mozilla Firefox

Click on Tools, then Options (or Edit | Preferences on Linux)
Select Privacy
In the Cookies panel, click on Show Cookies
To remove a single cookie click on the entry in the list and click on the Remove Cookie button
To remove all cookies click on the Remove All Cookies button

Netscape Navigator 7.x

Choose Cookie Manager from the Tools menu.
Choose Manage Stored Cookies.
Remove any cookie from the list, or remove all cookies.

Netscape Navigator 6.x

Choose Cookie Manager from the Tools menu.
Choose Manage Stored Cookies.
Remove any cookie from the list, or remove all cookies.

Netscape Navigator 4.x

In Netscape, all cookies are stored into one file, called Cookies.txt, in the user preferences folder, making them easy to find and delete. The folder can be located by using your file management software to search your hard disk drive for "cookies.txt".
Users of Netscape Navigator 4.x may also stop cookies from being written to the hard drive, by making the cookies file read only. However, even if the browser can't "write" cookies to the hard drive, it can still cache them, and it may create a new cookie file.

Opera

To delete all cookies at the end of every session, select it in the privacy settings under Tools > Preferences.
Click on Manage cookies to delete specific cookies or cookies from specific domains.
To delete all cookies immediately, go to Delete private data on the Tools menu.

Deepnet Explorer 1.1+

Choose Tools and then Internet Options
Click the Privacy tab
Move the slider to choose your preferred settings.

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Apple Macintosh

Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 (MacOS X)

Choose Preferences from Explorer menu
Select Receiving Files options
Select Cookies
Select the Cookies to be deleted from the list
Press Delete button

Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 (MacOS 9)

Choose Preferences from Edit menu
Select Receiving Files options
Select Cookies
Select the Cookies to be deleted from the list
Press Delete button

Mozilla

Choose Cookie Manager from the Tools menu.
Choose Manage Stored Cookies.
Remove any cookie from the list, or remove all cookies.

Netscape Navigator 7.x

Choose Cookie Manager from the Tools menu.
Choose Manage Stored Cookies.
Remove any cookie from the list, or remove all cookies.

Netscape Navigator 6.x

Choose Cookie Manager from the Tools menu.
Choose Manage Stored Cookies.
Remove any cookie from the list, or remove all cookies.

Safari 1.0 (MacOS X)

Choose Preferences from Safari menu
Select Security icon
Press Show Cookies button
Select the Cookies to be deleted from the list
Press Delete button

Opera

To delete all cookies at the end of every session, select it in the privacy settings under Opera > Preferences
Click on Manage cookies to delete specific cookies or cookies from specific domains.
To delete all cookies immediately, go to Delete private data on the Tools menu.

How to Remove Windows Genuine Advantage Notifications

Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) notifications occur when your computer hasn't passed the validation test. The validation test can be failed due to being sold a pirated (non-genuine) copy of XP, or because you have changed your XP product key to a software-generated key, or sometimes it just happens for no reason at all. The failed validation installs three types of notifications on your computer: one on the log in screen, one log in timer, and one balloon. It also stops updates from Microsoft and disables your ability to install IE7 and Windows Media Player 11. This solution can get rid of all three notifications, even though you will still not be able to update through Windows Update. You will not be able to download things from Microsoft that requires a valid license either.

Steps.

Delete Method

 

1. If you have only just installed Windows Genuine Advantage notifications, simply using the system restore function will remove the program. Then refuse to accept the WGA update next time Windows updates. Otherwise, proceed as detailed below. (NOTE: If you try these steps while you are in "Safe Mode," step #8 is unnecessary).
   
   
2. 2
   First, try the following:  
   1. Open a Command Prompt window by clicking on Start -> Run. Type CMD and press OK.
   2. Change Directory into the System32 Folder (type cd \windows\system32)
   3. Open a Notepad window and type the following lines:
      • taskkill -IM wgatray.exe
      • del wgatray.exe
      • del wgalogon.old
   4. Highlight and copy the three lines above to the Clipboard.
   5. Paste the contents of the Clipboard to Command Prompt.
3. 3
   This should kill the wgatray.exe process from the Taskbar and immediately delete both files wgatray.exe and wgalogon.dll without the need to to go through all steps bellow.
4. 4
   If that does not work, follow the steps below:  
   1. Open System32 by either of the following methods:
      
      
      • 

        Click "Start" -> "Run", then type "system32".
        Click "Start" -> "Run", then type "system32". Click "Okay".
      • Find system32 manually by clicking "Start" > "My Computer" > "(C:)" (or whatever your drive letter is) > "WINDOWS" > "system32".
        
   2. In "system32", go to "Tools" > "Folder options", click on the tab, "View", and uncheck "Hide extensions for known file types" if it is not already.
   3. Check to make sure the window that comes up has a full screen of various files. The files are in alphabetical order, which makes it easier to locate the specific file.
   4. 

      Find "WgaLogon.
      Find "WgaLogon.dll" and rename it "WgaLogon.dll.bak".
   5. Create an empty copy of WgaLogon.dll:
      
      
      • Right click on a blank space in system32 and select "New" > "Text Document".
        Right click on a blank space in system32 and select "New" > "Text Document".
      • Leave the text document empty and label it "WgaLogon.dll". Press Enter (on your keyboard).
      • 

        You may get a warning from the above step that says, "If you change a file name extension, the file may become unusable.
        You may get a warning from the above step that says, "If you change a file name extension, the file may become unusable. Are you sure you want to change it?". Click "Yes" on this warning.
   6. Be ready to complete the next two steps very quickly! Find "WgaTray.exe" in "system32" and delete it. You will then have 5 seconds to find "WgaTray.exe" in the Task Manager (the next step). NOTE: If you remove the files mentioned above while you are in "Safe Mode," step #8 is unnecessary.
   7. 

      Immediately open Task Manager.
      Immediately open Task Manager. You can do this by pressing the Ctrl, Shift, and Esc keys simultaneously, pressing the Ctrl, Alt, and Delete keys simultaneously, or right clicking the Taskbar and selecting "Task Manager". Click on the process tab and click end process when "WgaTray.exe" is selected. Note: If you take longer, do not panic! All that will happen is that "WgaTray.exe" will keep reappearing in the processes list (i.e. you won't be able to delete it as required). To remove the notifications after this, return to system32. You will find two files:"WgaLogon.dll.bak" (the one you renamed) and an Application Extension (0KB) called "WgaLogon.dll". Delete the Application Extension, rename "WgaLogon.dll.bak" to "WgaLogon.dll" and repeat the steps from the fifth one onwards (at a greater speed!!).
5. 5
   Restart your computer once you have finished. All the notification messages should be gone.

"Who invented the computer?"

"Who invented the computer?" is not a question with a simple answer. The real answer is that many inventors contributed to the history of computers and that a computer is a complex piece of machinery made up of many parts, each of which can be considered a separate invention.
This series covers many of the major milestones in computer history (but not all of them) with a concentration on the history of personal home computers.
 BYE