Advice on computer maintenance for small businesses - By: Karl Simtech

As a general rule, businesses aim to begin replacing computer hardware every 4 – 5 years. This is a policy that ensures computer efficiency is kept to a level were business does not suffer due to slow loading times or more regular software failures and crashes. It also ensures that as standard Microsoft Windows operating system platforms change, the software your computers are running does not get left behind.
Over this time period there are several simple methods of keeping system performance as high as possible and many free tools available on the internet to help do this:
Removing Old Programs

From a computer running Microsoft Windows XP, click [Start > Control Panel] and fro the control panel windows, double click the “Add or Remove Programs” button.

The ‘Add or Remove Programs’ window will list all of the application currently installed on your computer. The more applications, the slower the system performance! Scroll though the list and click the ‘Remove’ button for the ones that can be removed.
***Do not remove something if you do not know what it is***

Keeping Your Disks Clean and Organized

1. De-fragmenting your hard drives is a process by which the machine organizes all of the data it holds into the tightest file structure it can, and to create large regions of free space.
To defrag your hard drive click [Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Disk Defragmenter]
Clicking the ‘Analyze’ button will run a process to check if your disk will benefit from de-fragmentation. If the system recommends it be done, click ‘Defragment’
2. Cleaning out old files is simple. Windows has a built-in program for this, and there are plenty of free tools available from the internet.
The windows ‘Disk Cleanup’ program can be found in the System Tools folder (see above). Running it is extremely easy, just select the disk you want to clean from the drop down menu and click ‘Ok’.
3. Anti-Virus software is a highly recommended preventative measure against infection from malicious code. But there are other ways of detecting infected files and removing performance debilitation programs.

Spybot is a very popular free tool, available to download from the internet, that searches for traces of bugs that many top anti-virus programs can miss, and removes them. It is simplistic and can be configured to protect in a schedule that suits your requirements.
http://download.cnet.com/Spybot-Search-Destroy/3000-8022_4-10122137.html

MalwareBytes is another very popular free program that removes Malware,Adware, Spyware, etc that can slip by your Anti-Virus software. It is again, very easy to use and keep upto date, a great program for removing unwanted code.

http://download.cnet.com/Malwarebytes-Anti-Malware/3000-8022_4-10804572.html
Programs like these will not review your internet activity and attempt to block attacks from harmful code, they must be activated and just search through your existing files. They are both however extremely effective programs and are updated regularly to ensure new viruses are tracked and dealt with.
4. Upgrading Existing Hardware
Perhaps the most common cause of a computers deterioration of performance is its lack of system memory. The older a machine, the more data is has and thereby the less system memory to allocate to each process it is running.
Installing additional system memory is a fairly cheap and very straight forward way of increasing system performance. It is important to research which memory core to install before purchasing as memory cores are not universally compatible; once a part is found installing is a quick job and the benefits will be noticed immediately.
All of this advice, if acted upon will help your computers to run more efficiently; but it’s important to realize when a computer has reached the end of its useful lifetime and must be replaced.
Computers are just tools, and when a tool breaks you have to get a new one.
Simtech-IT procures and installs computer equipment on behalf of our customers, and due to our relationship with specialist suppliers we can offer saving on computers, laptops, servers, monitors, network equipment, printers and many other type of computer hardware and software.

About the Author

Business IT Support provider, enabling a business to outsource all its IT and Business Computer Support requirements to a dedicated helpdesk with a single point of contact in the Bristol.

Article Directory Source: http://www.articlerich.com/profile/Karl-Simtech/230054

Additional Articles From - Home | Computers | Css