DIVISION OF CITY SCHOOLS MANILA Week 10 – Lesson 1

TIMOTEO PAEZ INTEGRATED SCHOOL (HS)

Technology Education Department
Younger Street, Balut Tondo, Manila

TOPIC: Desktop Icons

At the end of the topic, students are expected to

1) Identify common desktop icons.
2) Recognize the advantages of desktops icons.
3) Create desktop shortcuts.

LEARNING CONTENT

Computer Hardware Maintenance

Computer hardware maintenance involves taking care of the computer's physical components, such
as its keyboard, hard drive and internal CD or DVD drives. Cleaning the computer, keeping its fans
free from dust, and defragmenting its hard drives regularly are all parts of a computer hardware
maintenance program.

Physical Maintenance

Keeping computer clean and avoiding extreme temperature can help to maintain hardware.
(https://www.techwalla.com/articles/what-is-computer-hardware-maintenance)

Desktops are designed usually with cooling systems (cooling fans) for power supply and CPU (cooling
through ventilation). It is recommended for the desktop to have a big case (tower) in order for the
components to have as much space as possible for a proper cooling. In addition, youcan change your
standard CPU fan with a more advanced one. This will create a better airflow and it will efficiently
cool the CPU heat.

Another key component of your computer is the Random Access Memory (RAM), which also needs to
be cooled. This can be done using heat spreaders (from aluminum or copper) or ram fans. This way
the heat is dissipated and allows the memory to function efficiently.

The hard drive can be cooled also using hard drive fans depending on the fans type they can be
mounted on the hard drive. Verify what kind of system is used to cool your video card. Often its use
a heat conductive metal and above is a fan which helps increase cooling. Even if your card has a
silent fan you should change the fan with a better one to assure a proper cooling.

All cooling gathers air in the case and the power supply fan will take it out. It is recommended to add
an additional fan on the case to bring cool air inside the case to assure proper air flow.

Note:

Before adding cooling devices to your system, verify if your power supply can sustain the needed
power. If the power supply can't provide enough energy to all components it might shut down like a
safety measure. Cooling system accumulates dust and this can cause the cooling air flow to be
disrupted and components to overheat. Spray with compressed air to clean it out.Laptops through
their design have a cooling system which was tested by their manufacturer but can also improve it
by purchasing a cooling pad. Usually for most laptops the cooling vents are situated at the bottom of
the laptop. Bottom vents will draw cool air into the system and side or rear vents will blow the air
out.
Adding the pad, which has one or more fans incorporated, increases air flow and helps it to cool faster
and better. If you uses Mac book you don't need a pad because his vents aresituated behind the
keyboard.

Take your battery out when your laptop is plugged into AC power. The reason why we recommend
this procedure is because batteries are designed with a defined number of charges-discharges cycles
and by using less cycle possible that you prolong your battery’s life. Also during the charging –
discharging cycles the battery dissipates heat. By removing the battery you remove another heat
source of your laptop.

When using your battery keep in mind to use a pad to cool your battery and to maintain it at standard
temperature. Your computer's position in room is also important. Avoid positioning your computer to
direct sunlight. The heat generated by the sun will heat the computer's case or LCD screen.

It's a known fact that prolonged sun exposure will cause degradation to your plastic components.
Avoid also to position it in dusty and high transit areas. If they are placed in these areas, verify
frequently your computer for dust. Avoid keeping your computer in unused rooms with low
temperatures. This environment facilitates the condensation effect.

Prevention and Maintaining Methods

1. Use lightning protective electrical outlet in combination with Uninterruptable Power Supply (UPS).
The UPS will assure the quality of electrical power and will prevent loss of data during a power outage.
It will also provide you enough time to save any files you were working on. Another advantage of the
UPS is that it protects your computer from shutting down improperly and it will take in any electrical
socks. Electrical socks usually damage your system components, mainly those with electrical
motors like Hard Drive and CD-ROM.

For laptops, data lost can be avoided during a blackout if the battery is in.

2. Keep your monitor clean by using lint-free cloth with special cleaning solution.
https://computerstepbystep.com/computer-maintanence.html#Periodical_computer_maintenance

System Maintenance

It is the modification of a system to correct faults, to improve performance, or to adapt the system to
a changed environment or changed requirements. https://www.bitpipe.com/tlist/Systems-
Maintenance.html Keeps your system functioning smoothly by managing hard drive space, scanning
for system errors and regularly defragmenting the hard drive. Virus protection is also important, as
some viruses can interfere with computer hardware

Managing your Hard Drive Space

Hard disks can be divided in multiple storage units also called partitions. This process is required to
separate operating system and programs files from work files. During windows installation, you will
need to determine the size of the hard disk partition on which the operating system will be installed.
The amount dedicated to the system drive should be at least the doubled amount of your operating
system space requirements. If you plan to add more applications and features, estimate an average
of needed space and added it to the above amount. You need also to add a few more GB as a
precaution for additional components, future service packs and virtual memory. The basic principle
is to allow considerably more disk space than the minimum.
Benefits of Managing Hard Drive
1. Data Safety - by saving your work files or other important files to other partitions makes the
recovery from a system.
2. Best System Performance - by saving your files to other partitions the system has a constant free
space amount at its disposal.
3. Increased Speed Accessing Files - by creating multiple partitions the speed of
accessing files is considerably increased (it takes longer to read from 1 MFT (master
file table) of one hard disk partition than from smaller MFTs of smaller partitions)
4. Recoverable Data – if one drive gets corrupted the other drives remain intact. It is also related to
disk space is the maintenance of your desktop files
All files that are stored on desktop are really saved in your account profile which is located on your
system drive. Most people save their data on desktop from convenience reasons. However, this causes
your system partition to fill up and eventually to slow down your computer. Lack of free space affects
your virtual memory and your data safety. When the system is running out of free space it will show
a balloon message with “Low disk space” with the possibility to start a disk cleanup.
5. Keep your computer protected and up to date - computer's health is very important. Various steps
must be taken prior to use to assure best protection and functionality and to prevent malicious
software to put the computer at risk: