There are a lot of us who do not understand our laptops and personal computers even though we spend most of our waking hours with them. There always seem to be small issues we do not know how to fix making us wish for a new one. But no matter how many new ones you buy, all laptops will eventually reach this point if you don’t know how to take care of it. The Week talked to our in-house IT experts, to help you solve some basic issues, both of whom said that almost 90% of any windows issue will be solved by simply restarting the computer. But when that doesn’t help, here’s what you can do.
Slow startup
There is a reason behind why windows seem to take longer to load when you download a lot of software on your computer. Some applications automatically add themselves to the list of programs that start when you switch it on. To avoid this, if you are using windows 8 or 10, right click on the task bar and open the task manager. Under the startup tab, you can see all the applications that start when you switch on your computer. You can choose to disable items here. If you are on windows 7, XP, or vista, type ‘msconfig.exe’ on the search bar on the start menu. Click on the startup tab and uncheck all the boxes of items you don’t want to run during startup. Be careful here for you may uncheck an integral startup program.
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Slow computer
Computers usually become slow when there is a buildup of temporary or junk files. This can be cleaned up with the help of CC cleaner. Just install and run the software and it will help clear the RAM and make your computer faster. Similarly, you can also clear the cache buildup on your PC. Open My Computer and go to your operating system drive. On most PCs, this is the C drive. Open the windows folder and look for a folder labeled prefetch. Delete all the files on this folder to free some space on your RAM as well.
Heating problems
Have you become concerned with how your laptop keeps heating up to an uncomfortable level? Have you also been using your laptop in bed, on top of the blankets during the winter seasons? The fan on the laptop attracts dust that has gathered on the blankets which clogs it and heats the laptop. Avoid this by using a clean crate of eggs when you have to use your laptop in bed. The crates have good air circulation that will help keep your laptop cool. You can also use a blower (not a hair drier or a vacuum cleaner) to get the dust to come out of the insides of your laptop. Just blow the air through the sides of the laptop where there is space for air to circulate. This will help cool down your laptop by clearing the fan. If you put a lot of strain on your laptop it is bound to heat up quicker. Gamers often complain that their laptops heat really quickly when they are playing games. This is because the load of processing is more than your laptop is capable of handling.
Browser speed
Cookies are files that get stored on the user’s computer and are designed to hold a small amount of data. Almost all the websites have cookies that we need to enable in order to access the sites. Cookies are also how some websites infect our computer with viruses. Clearing the cookies on the websites you don’t access as much will help run your browser faster. Clearing history every once in a while also makes your browser run faster. Google Chrome loads all kinds of plug-ins automatically and has a lot of things running in the background that makes your computer run a little slower and drains your battery faster as well. The reason mac runs faster than windows pc is because both the hardware and software it uses is developed by the same company. Running microsoft edge makes your windows run smoother as well because the tuning of the program and the computer is better.
Click baits
There are a lot of quizzes, especially on Facebook that makes us reroute from one website to another and makes us allow access to the Facebook profile. During this re-routing, you have to make sure your information isn’t being misused. Read what the page wants access to before you allow access. Most of the sites that don’t require you to enter your passwords are safe. When websites like this ask for your password, it is for their own database and you should close the page without giving it any further thought.
Mistyping
Most of us have faced this problem at least once in our lives when the keys we press don’t correspond with the letters that appear on screen. This usually happens when the language settings of your laptop sometimes change. If you have been facing this problem, open control panel and select the ‘language’ folder. The keyboard we commonly use is English – US, or US international. If it has been changed to anything else, change it back to any one of these two and you are good to go.
Routers
One of the most common IT problems these days is the router resetting. This happens mostly because the router hanged. Most of the routers have their IP addresses written on the back of their boxes, which is what will help you re-configure it. Type in the IP address on the address bar and a login page will pop up. Mostly the username and password for this page are both ‘admin’. When you have logged in; you can change the name of your router, the password and the security setting. The most common security setting is WPA-2 while the setting easiest to hack is WEP.
