Ecomhelpdesk

Computer Maintenance

Daily steps to maintain computer health

If you want to keep your computer in tip-top shape, there are a few things you should do every day:

1. Delete Cookies, Delete Files, Clear History. Internet Explorer creates temporary internet files. It is best to clear them out regularly. Load Internet Explorer. Select Internet Options from the Tools menu. On the General tab, choose Delete Cookies, Delete Files, and Clear History. If you have cookies or passwords that you like to keep, download the free utility Internet Sweeper. It will make this cleanup easier.

2. Take out the trash. Empty your Recycle Bin daily.

3. Reboot your computer once a day. Use Start/Shut Down/Restart. Not all programs you run release memory and resources fully when you quit them. Restarting once a day will fix this.

4. Update your virus definitions. If you don't use an anti-virus program, you need to get one. Make sure that you turn on Automatic Live Update.

Weekly Maintenance

Disk Cleanup - running system cleanup at least once a week deletes unnecessary temp files, temporary internet files and your recycle bin freeing up hard drive space that can slow down your computer. You can access System Clean up by clicking on Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Disk Cleanup.

When running System Cleanup I recommend clicking on the more options tab and clicking on the clean up button next to System Restore. This can clear up a lot of space on your hard drive and doesn't cause any harm to your system restore file.

Disk Defragmenter - as you create and edit files on your computer they get saved on your hard drive. Each file is allocated so much space within one location on your hard drive and for large files they may take up more space, thus having to take up more than one space on the hard drive.

The computer tries to keep files contiguous to keep seek and access times down, but gradually files get broken in smaller chunks of information spread over the whole hard drive. This causes hard drives to grind and be slow, while the hard drive spends a long time putting all these fragments together in memory so you can view your file.

Running disk defragmenter at least once week will keep your file fragments down and allow your hard drive to work more efficiently. You can run disk defragmenter by Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Disk Defragmenter and then select the drive you want to defragment.

Check Disk - this program checks the hard drive for problems with the logical configuration of your hard drive and the surface areas of the hard drive. Check Disk can also fix errors as it runs, too. This is an important tool when maintaining any computer. To run Check Disk, click My Computer, right click on the hard drive you want to run Check Disk, select Properties, click on the tools tab and click the check now button next to Error Checking. Check the box Automatically fix file system errors and click Start.

Shortly after starting Check Disk an error will occur telling you that the program could not complete the check because Check Disk needs access to certain Windows files. You will be asked if you would like to finish running Check Disk the next time you start your computer, click yes. Check Disk will run the upon rebooting your computer.

You will notice that you can select to run Disk Defragmenter from here, too.

Update Virus Definitions - This is very important to ensure your computer is up to date on the latest virus threats in cyberspace.

Shut Down - I recommend doing a complete shut down of your computer, at least once a week when practical. I understand that some machines cannot be shut down, but it is very important for the operating system to have a complete reboot at least once a week to lower operating system degradation.

Your computer is a complex machine and the loss of one bit of information can botch up the whole works. This can go a long way in extending the life of your current installation of your operating system.

Find files by date modified in Windows

Using datemodified: in Windows File Explorer in Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8 will allow you to find any files that have been modified by a date of your choice. Using this tip can be helpful for anyone who has lost a file but know when they last modified the file. Follow the below steps to get the date or date range window shown in the picture to the right.

1. Open the Windows File Explorer

2. In the search box, in the top right corner of the window type datemodified:

3. After datemodified: has been typed the "Select a date or date range" window will appear, select the date or date range for when you believe the file was last modified.

4. Depending on the dates this search may take a few seconds to a minute to complete.

Microsoft Excel shortcut keys

F2 : Edit the selected cell.

F5 : Go to a specific cell. For example, C6.

F7 : Spell check selected text or document.

F11 : Create chart.

Ctrl + Shift + ; : Enter the current time.

Ctrl + ; : Enter the current date.

Alt + Shift + F1 : Insert New Worksheet.

Shift + F3 : Open the Excel formula window.

Shift + F5 : Bring up search box.

Ctrl + A : Select all contents of the worksheet.

Ctrl + B : Bold highlighted selection.

Ctrl + I : Italic highlighted selection.

Ctrl + K : Insert link.

Ctrl + U : Underline highlighted selection.

Ctrl + 5 : Strikethrough highlighted selection.

Ctrl + P : Bring up the print dialog box to begin printing.

Ctrl + Z : Undo last action.

Ctrl + F9 : Minimize current window.

Ctrl + F10 : Maximize currently selected window.

Ctrl + F6 : Switch between open workbooks or windows.

Ctrl + Page up : Move between Excel work sheets in the same Excel document.

Ctrl + Page down : Move between Excel work sheets in the same Excel document.

Ctrl + Tab : Move between Two or more open Excel files.

Alt + = : Create a formula to sum all of the above cells

Ctrl + ' : Insert the value of the above cell into cell currently selected.

Ctrl + Shift + ! : Format number in comma format.

Ctrl + Shift + $ : Format number in currency format.

Ctrl + Shift + # : Format number in date format.

Ctrl + Shift + % : Format number in percentage format.

Ctrl + Shift + ^ : Format number in scientific format.

Ctrl + Shift + @ : Format number in time format.

Ctrl + Arrow key : Move to next section of text.

Ctrl + Space : Select entire column.

Shift + Space : Select entire row.

How to Store Your Files and Manage Your Hard Disk

පළමුව ඔබගේ වටිනා දත්තයන් ගබඩා කල යුතුය ස්ථානය නිවැරදිව හඳුනා ගත යුතුය. එනම් ඔබගේ පරිගණකයේ මෙහෙයුම් පද්ධතිය කි‍්‍රයාත්මක වන C Drive එක හැර ඉතිරි Drive එනම් D:E යොදා ගැනීම Data වල සුරක්‍ෂිත බව වැඩි කිරීමට හේතු වේ.

Select My Document Right Click Properties පසුව D:E වෙත Store Place එක Move කර ගත හැක.

මෙය පරිගණකයේ මෑත කාලීන දෝෂ නිරාකරණයට ඉවහල් වේ.

පරිගණක භාවිතා කරන බොහෝ පුද්ගලයන් Data Copy කිරීම සිදුකරනු ලබන්නේ Desktop එක මතය මෙමඟින් පරිගණකයේ මෙහෙයුමද මන්දගාමී වේ.

ඔබ ඔබගේ වටිනා දත්තයන් පිළිබඳව වඩාත් සිතන අයෙක් නම් පරිගණකයේ Hard Disk එක පිළිබඳ දැනුවත් විය යුතුය. යම් ආකාරයකින් Hard Disk එකෙන් විවිධ ශබ්ද ඇසෙන්නේනම් එහි Data වල ආරක්ෂාව සඳහා Computer Enginneer කෙනෙකු හමුවී උපදෙස් ලබා ගත යුතුවේ.

ඔබගේ අතවශ්‍ය Files සහ Folders සියල්ලම Backup Copy එකක් හෝ දෙකක් වෙන Storage Media භාවිතයෙන් ආරක්ෂා කර ගැනීම යෝග්‍ය වන්නේ Storage Media මෙම (Hard Disk Drive, USB Pen, External Drive,CD, DVD, Tape) ඕනෑම විටකදී Fail වීමට ඇති ඉඩ කඩ නිසාය.

සති දෙකකට වරක් පමණ පරිගණකය තුළ අලූතින් System Restore Point එකක් create කරගැනීමද Data වල ආරක්ෂාවට හේතූ වේ.

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