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Laptops are costly investments. Even if you purchase a relatively cheap one, you probably want to do everything in your power to protect your investment and verify your laptop lasts as long as possible. If you want to ensure your laptop doesn’t fall apart before its time, follow these tips.
1Clean Your Laptop Regularly
This might sound too obvious to warrant mentioning, but you’d be surprised how many people forget to do this. In fact, when was the last time youreally cleaned your laptop?What about the last time you cleaned out all the debris from your keyboard? Cleaning might not seem like a big deal, but it’s very important, especially around the keyboard, vents, touchpad, and display.
At worst, failure to clean these areas will contribute to physical damage, like your keys not working or your internal components overheating. At best, the functionality of these areas might be temporarily inhibited by dirt and debris.Sticky keys, anyone?Not only should you clean your laptop regularly, but you should invest in the right supplies for cleaning them too.
A microfiber cloth is a must-have for your screen, to ensure you don’t scratch it while cleaning. Pressurized air canisters are also a great investment for cleaning out dust and debris from tiny crevices. Small brushes and cotton swabs will also verify you don’t scratch any surfaces.
You may feel inclined to use regular household cleaners, dish soap, or paper towels, but don’t do it. The preferred materials I’ve mentioned are already pretty cheap, and you can usually buy them in dedicated laptop cleaning kits.
2Optimize Your Battery Consumption
you may always buy a new battery, but you probably don’t want to do that too often, just for money’s sake. There are several things you can do to optimize your battery’s lifespan. To start, try to keep your laptop plugged in most of the time.
You may have heard thatit’s dangerous to leave your battery charging all the time, especially if your battery is charged to full. This can be true in some cases, but modern computers have automatic overcharging protection in place for this and usebypass chargingwhen the battery is full. The real problem is constantly having your battery at or near a full charge, which wears it.
This is why you’ll want to turn on charge limiting for your battery. It’s recommended to set your battery so it only charges to a maximum of 80%. Unfortunately, there’s no universal way to do this, as different laptops from different manufacturers have different ways of doing it.
For instance, with my Acer laptop, there’s an app called “Care Center” that allows me to set my battery charge limit to 80%. You’ll probably have to look up the exact steps to activate this setting for your particular laptop. If your laptop has an easily removable battery, you can also just pop it out whenever your laptop is plugged in to achieve similar results.
Finally, be sure to go into your settings andoptimize your battery performance, and never allow your battery to deplete completely to zero charge. LIthium batteries also wear out more quickly if they’re drained all the way to zero often.
3Ensure Proper Ventilation
Your laptop relies on fans and vents to keep your device cool. These vents need to be unobstructed at all times to guarantee airflow to your valuable internal components. Depending on your laptop, the vents might be in nice, intuitive spots that are rarely blocked, in which case you might not have to worry much.
However, many laptops have vents on the bottom or the sides, which can be more easily obstructed. As a general rule of thumb, you should place your laptop on hard, flat surfaces. Putting your laptop on soft materials like blankets, pillows, or even the clothes on your lap can block airflow and trap heat, which could lead tooverheating your internal components, which are expensive to replace.
If you really want to use your laptop on your lap or in your bed, consider getting alaptop standto provide that hard surface. Finally, if you need to travel with your laptop, always make sure it’s off before putting it in a bag, since that will also obstruct airflow and trap heat around the device.
4Store Your Laptop in Safe Places
Most of us don’t really think about where our laptop rests when we’re not using it. I’m just as guilty as anyone else. But where your laptop sits when not in use is very important. You don’t want to leave your laptop in hot places or indirect sunlight, which could cause heat damage to the components. You don’t want to store it anywhere too humid either: water and electronics aren’t good friends.
In fact, humidity can besuch a problemthat, if you live in a naturally humid climate, you may want to invest in a dehumidifier for the room your laptop is in. Doubly so if you live near the ocean, as salt water is even worse for electronics.
Finally, don’t place any objects on top of your computer. Even light objects could cause problems over time if you use your closed laptop as a resting place too often. Aside from small aesthetic damage, putting pressure on your laptop like that could cause cracks or deformation in both the screen and chassis. Objects on top of the laptop could even press the screen down onto the keyboard, causing more damage.
5Invest in a Dedicated Travel Bag
Look, I’m guilty of just throwing my laptop in a backpack and calling it a day when I need to travel. And honestly, my laptop was never any worse off for it in those days. Even so, I recommend gettingdedicated protectionfor your laptop when you are traveling, because you never know when you’ll accidentally drop your bag, or when something else in that bag will get jostled against your laptop.
Besides, laptop bags are super nifty. They often come with several pockets and partitions, so you can carry other items in them along with your laptop. Sometimes I even use a laptop bag to carry everything I need for a single-night stay somewhere. If you already have a bag you would like to travel with, you can settle for a laptop sleeve to provide padding for your device when you bring it with you.
It only takes one bad fall with your unprotected laptop in a backpack to break a hinge or crack the screen, and laptop bags and sleeves aren’t too expensive. Remember, paying a small amount of money to protect your expensive assets is always worth the peace of mind and the price of repairing that expensive asset when things go wrong!
Ultimately, this is just the hardware side of keeping your laptop safe and healthy for years to come. But the software side is just as important, so don’t neglect the digital aspect of your laptop’s healthif you want it to last! You need to take care of it in all ways to protect your investment.
