You may be one of those people who like to regularly maintain your laptop on your own rather than take it to a service center every few months to get checked. For those tech-savvy individuals who feel that they can do their own maintenance checks on their laptop units, this is an article that may just prove useful. Like any other great piece of equipment (like cars and boats), laptop units require the regular hardware and software maintenance to keep them running optimally and smoothly.

Many times, for many different laptop units, the first part to break down in the laptop fan which keeps the unit cool and functioning without it overheating. This is why it is vital that you keep the fan working in tip-top condition. The most basic maintenance check for the fan is to simply pay careful and close attention to little programs that will tell you your laptop’s fan status. You can install these programs, like Speed Fan or PC Wizard 2008, in your portable laptop and they will be the little voices that tell you the temperature of your central processing unit. Keeping an eye on this regularly, especially when you use your laptop for longer periods of time than usual, will keep you updated on whether you should give your unit a rest or not. In general, if the CPU temperature exceeds 158 degrees Fahrenheit, then you will probably have to run laptop maintenance that will address the heat problem which is usually a need to clean out your fan and heat sink of dust particles. This is easily remedied by using a vacuum or blowing out the clogging dust with a burst of compressed air.

Another thing you should pay attention to in laptop maintenance is the software part which will help in protecting the data on your laptop unit. It is critical that you run the regular antivirus scans on your laptop with updated antivirus software. Keep your firewalls updated as well to keep out potential and real threats to your computer system. When inserting external data cards or USB thumb drives, always make sure you thoroughly scan them before doing any file transfers or file opening of any kind. As for your personal data, always keep it backed-up regularly so that you never lose it all at once in any kind of laptop hard disk crash.

Other maintenance tips will include regular defragmenting of files and disk checks to make sure all systems are sunning properly and efficiently. Defragmenting files will optimize your computer use and will prevent any of your programs from freezing or your system from crashing at any time. For those who own a laptop with a touchscreen, avoid using any chemicals on the touchscreen surface. Instead, just use a damp cloth and gently rub the dirty surfaces and rub the wet areas again with a dry microfiber cloth. Avoid getting water in the edges of the touchscreen in case the water seeps down into more sensitive parts of the screen. For your keyboard, use a soft brush to brush away any dirt that lodges in between the keys, and rub other surfaces with soft microfiber cloth.

There will come a time when you will have to make that hard decision of finally getting your child a laptop. With the demands in education today, it is now becoming a normal trend for any student to own a laptop especially if assignments are submitted through email or research is done online. But, ultimately, the decision will lie with you. Decide if you think it is best for your child to have a laptop, if not, then I don’t think it would be such a bad thing for your kid to just stick with the home desktop computer in your study.

But when you do decide to get a laptop for your child, here are some things that you may want to consider. First question is “What will your child use the laptop for?” You’ll be surprised about how tech-savvy most kids nowadays are. In the old days, buying a child a laptop was buying them a toy that just looked like a laptop but actually only taught them how to spell. Today, many kids know what a laptop is and will use it the way an adult does. If the main purpose of the laptop is to do online research or homework, you may want to consider getting a netbook for them instead. This may come out cheaper and will address the need at hand. But be sure you are comfortable with allowing your child to go online, possibly unsupervised, when he or she does homework on the internet.

Another consideration is price. You may not want to invest on an overly sophisticated piece of equipment for your child because the chances are high that they may need something more up to date as they grow older. By researching on the internet you will find some interesting deals on cheaper laptops like the ASUS Eee PC (under $300) which is small, portable, and adequate for internet use and basic word processing capabilities. Another choice would be the Acer Aspire notebooks that you can purchase for under $350. Generally, these two notebooks are good enough for kids to use without you having to shell out too much cash.

Remember, laptops don’t always have to be portable unless you say so as a parent. You can invest in something more high-end if you decide to make the laptop the “home laptop” so that everyone in your household can share it. With a high-end laptop you can satisfy the needs of older kids who require the use of certain heavy software packages to manipulate images and multimedia formats. This can also offer gaming options for the kids if you allow them to do online gaming with supervision.

Overall, again it will be up to you whether you think your child is ready for a laptop. You should take into consideration the age of your child and the amount of responsibility he or she is already displaying in terms of looking after electronics and personal property. Also think about how well and comfortably your child uses the computer before deciding on whether to purchase one for his or her use.

You might find this article a little funny to read, especially since many laptop do’s and don’ts only require common sense. But you’ll be surprised by some of the things laptop owners do to their poor laptop units that lead to heightened wear and tear, and shortened laptop life. I had a colleague who fell asleep on top of his laptop and woke up to a black screen that would never work again. It would boot, he could hear it, but nothing would appear on the screen. This is just one example of simple laptop use rules – don’t fall asleep on your laptop!

When you own your very own laptop, it is vital that you keep it in tip-top condition so that you can get the most out of the unit and experience a long, healthy and productive relationship with it. Always make sure that your laptop is stored in a dry and cool area, and never store it in direct sunlight. Make sure that your laptop is always in a stable and secure place where if jolted in any way, it will not easily fall and break.

When using your portable laptop, do not use it next to any other piece of equipment that emits heat. Therefore, do not place it too close to another laptop unit whose fan is running and releasing hot air from within the unit to keep it cool. When laptops are connected to a DLP or LCD projector, be sure that your laptop is not directly facing the fan system of the DLP unit. DLP units tend to heat up quickly due to the high lumens that the projector lights contain to project images, which is why their fans release a hot air when the unit it in use. Keep your laptop away from this hot air if you want it to keep working in top order. Never use your laptop when you are drinking a beverage or are eating food. Any food or beverage that gets in contain with your laptop may just destroy vital functional parts of it.

When using a wifi signal that is external to your usual one, be sure first that your laptop’s antivirus software is updated and functioning. Also make sure that your laptop’s firewall is in its correct security settings to prevent any kind of threat from getting into your computer system. Defragment your files and make a disk-check regularly on your laptop. Be sure that your antivirus updates itself automatically and does regular and schedule virus scans of your system.

For a little extra security, do not share any folders on your laptop and disable the service called printer and file sharing option on your computer just to make sure. When you surf the internet, don’t open suspicious emails from sources you do not know. This will prevent viruses from getting into your computer. Overall, by following the advice of the laptop manual and from the service centers that you bring your laptop to, you can be assured to expect the your unit to last the lifetime that your laptop company guaranteed you on the day that you purchased it.

To be honest, laptops have always been made for convenience rather than for ergonomics. Instead of fitting the worker to the laptop to maximize the health and wellbeing of the user, the laptop was created to fit the laptop to the environment to offer the worker the convenience of access to a unit, despite all the inconveniences of aches and pains that go with utilizing it. Using a laptop only give one two basic options. First is to place the laptop on a table where your arms have to reach up uncomfortably to reach the keyboard while you look at the screen at eye level. Second is to place the laptop onto your lap where you would have to bend your neck and hunch over to look at your screen, but at least your arms are in a more comfortable position. Either way, your back, arms, or neck will suffer.

Let me explore ways in which laptop makers have attempted to overcome this ergonomic problem by designing laptops which tried to solve either of the problems already presented. The DreamCom 10 of Germany made a bold move in designing a laptop that would allow the user to have the screen at eye level. This laptop unfolds three ways to allow for the laptop to initially create a foundation and support for the screen which can be further pulled up so that it reaches the user’s eye level. This is a nifty piece of equipment that will absolutely solve all the problems in arms, neck and back if the unit is placed on a low table. However, as a laptop that you put in your lap, it makes the task of actual “lap” top usage virtually impossible.

The Ferrari laptop made by Acer tried its best to solve the carpal tunnel syndrome problem in the wrists by modifying the laptop keyboard. This laptop is quite the looker with the Ferrari look that is reminiscent of the famous car and is thus suggestive of speed and efficiency. The new swivel mount device allows the user to use the laptop at any awkward angle and place by attaching it to the arm which makes the unit swivel into the most comfortable angle that your body intends to maintain. This is actually a very novel idea, but the very fact that you would have to assemble and disassemble the unit every time that you use it makes it a little tedious. This also defeats the purpose of the unit being immediately portable, especially when you just want to pack up and go.

Another great innovation is by O2 of UK that made waves with its Myvu Crystal accessory. This accessory is basically eyewear that the user will wear while utilizing the laptop. Instead of looking down at the screen, the Myvu Crystal glasses will display the actual laptop screen in the glasses so you only need to keep your posture and look ahead of you. This accessory is hands-free and is compatible with many laptop models. The downside is that if you were doing something that needed a lot of detail and some common productivity functions, then the goggles will pose a problem. Great piece of equipment though, when used with handheld mobiles. Just make sure you’re not doing anything else while you use it!

In the past it was either you had a laptop or a desktop, and both were easily distinguishable. Today, you can either have a laptop, a netbook, or a desktop, among many other computer units that are being released. But the main question most people have is ‘What is the difference between a laptop and a netbook?” they both look the same, they have similar functions, so why are they distinguished as netbooks by the companies that manufacture them?

In terms of functionality, a netbook will basically need the internet to function at its best. The net book is a much lighter model of laptop that probably doesn’t contain some of the heavy software that laptops and desktops can handle. The netbook is made ideally to do work online, all the time. Having a netbook and using in the cloud software is a dream when you have the right unit with the right connection. With Google’s release of their in the cloud operating system and office applications, a netbook is the perfect answer to using these light applications while staying connected to the internet.

A laptop on the other hand, is basically a desktop that is lighter, just as functional and portable. If I were to buy a netbook, I would probably not be able to use the regular heavy programs that I can on my laptop. For instance, using Photoshop and other Adobe Suite applications on a netbook may be the makings of a nightmare because the capacity of the netbook is lower and it would probably take forever to run just one of the programs.

A netbook is easily attached to an existing communications company that will provide it exclusive internet connection whenever and wherever it is. Having a netbook is basically like having a cellular phone with a service provider plan, except the connection is purely for the internet. Many phone companies, like AT&T or Sprint may make customers and special offer of getting a netbook with a connection, but with a two year lock-in period where you would be obliged to use that service. The upside is that with a low monthly fee, you can avail of a free netbook that comes with the service. Many times, deals like this is more cost-efficient for customers who basically live to be connected.

In general, netbooks are made much smaller than the usual laptop. They can fit in a handbag and basically function as a communications device rather than as a laptop. Since netbooks are smaller, they are lighter too. Since they are not too program-heavy, they generally run on Linux operating systems which are light and fast. However, there are netbook units that also reach the capacity of the regular laptop unit that are offered by Hewlett Packard, Acer or Dell for the more serious user who want to do serious heavy work aside from just surf the internet. Netbooks, in general, tend to be cheaper than regular laptops, which is why their popularity has soared for those who use laptops mainly just to get connected onto the World Wide Web.

I just discovered a neat networking feature that is present in most Windows powered laptops that have wireless networking capabilities. This is called ad-hoc networking and by using this feature I was able to connect two Windows Vista computers together. The coolest thing about this feature is that the only network devices needed are the two laptops, no router or access points are needed. I imagine a scenario where I am somewhere in the country writing an article and my friend, who is with me, is co-writing a different part of the same article. As my friend is writing, I see his work progressing in real time and he is likewise able to monitor my digressions.   I know that the same results can be accomplished by exchanging files with USB sticks, or just by simply peeking into his computer screen but the promise of collaborating on networked computers independent from any network infrastructure is simply mind blowing to me.

While word processors do not allow two people to simultaneously edit the same file, there are software that allow this to happen, a common example being databases. As someone who understand field research, data is encoded on databases and the cool thing with ad-hoc networks is that two or more people can encode data into the same database simultaneously while on field, independent of the office network. This is a great time saver and more importantly, the data is stored in one location, that is, the laptop where the database software is found.

Ad-hoc networking is a snap to setup in Vista. Select the Network and Sharing Center application in the Control Panel. In the task listing found on the upper left side of the Network and Sharing Center window, select the Set up a connection task or network task. Select the Set up a wireless ad-hoc (computer to computer) network option and just follow the steps outlined in the wizard.

If you want to give other people access to some of the files in your computer, you must have a folder who has its sharing permissions enabled. So in my earlier example of collaborative writing, I have file sharing enabled on my folder called Musings and set up my friend, who is helping me write, as a co-owner to the files in this folder. This way he is free to create a new file, edit it any which way he likes and save it.

Perhaps the greatest use of wireless ad-hoc networking is multi-player gaming. My friends and I use this feature all the time when we feel like just spending the weekend at home playing games.

The only requirement for wireless ad-hoc networking to work is that the wireless hardware should be on and working. If you want to make an ad-hoc network a laptop with a desktop that has no wireless adapter, then the next best thing is to connect the two machines together with that ancient artifact called the twisted pair cable. You can read how this is accomplished on the internet but won’t be discussed here because this article is on wireless networking, and besides, desktop PCs have no place on this blog.

Because I write a blog, I know a little bit about how web servers work. I came across a piece of software that is a one-click installer of all the files necessary to make any Windows powered computer a full pledged web server. Maybe you might have heard about the free, open source installer called WAMP. WAMP is an acronym that stands for Windows, Apache, MySQL and PHP. The AMP in WAMP stands for the software responsible for the business of serving dynamic web pages, such as this blog. WAMP was the name adopted by its makers as a reference to the LAMP technology stack which stands for Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP. In fact Wordpress is a freely downloadable blogging application that is written in the PHP dynamic language, and the words in this blog are stored in a MySQL database. The Apache Web Server makes it possible to serve my writings as web pages.

What use do I have for making my laptop a web server? It is because I like to experiment with my blog. I like to try several designs before deciding what to put up in my live web pages. I also like to try out variations in layout using CSS and the only reliable way of doing this is to have access to a web server. Of course I could do all the tweaking on my live server on the internet but I wouldn’t want to do this. It could be disastrous. What if I made a fatal mistake and make my blog unavailable to you my loyal readers?  So in my web browser, instead of logging in to http://portablelaptopguide.com to see my writings, I just type http://localhost/myblog for example, to see the web pages generated by my very own server. Localhost is just a convention adopted by the computer industry to refer to web server running locally on a computer.

So what I did was download WAMP, and installed it on my computer. There are a lot of articles on the web showing how this is done. Next thing I did was to download Wordpress. Again, articles on the web will show you how to do this correctly because you just cannot install Wordpress on any folder on your computer. It should be located inside the root folder of the Apache web server (there are actually exceptions to this rule).

Earlier I mentioned something about a technology stack. It is another example of computer jargon and it simply means the layers or set of software required to provide a service or a software solution. Web serving using WAMP or LAMP is a technology stack because to emit a dynamic web page requires the resources of a piece of software such as Apache which in turn requires PHP and MySQL which in turn requires the services of the operating system.

With a web server I can carry everywhere, I can write a blog article offline from the internet but still able to see how it will look like exactly when submitted. This is possible because the software I have in my Windows laptop is similar to the Linux web server that is dishing out my Wordpress blog articles on the internet.

This is the way I know how most professional web programmers work. They carry their very own web servers with them and when they want to collaborate on a new web site, they just meet together, network the laptops, assign one laptop to be the web server and start hacking out a web page.

I wanted an operating system that is light on resources yet enables me to work using standard office applications. Since Windows Vista has basically been a disappointment for me, I tried downloading Ubuntu’s latest desktop operating system after hearing so many great things about this free software to see how productive I could be. I went to ubuntu.com and went to the download page at www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download. This is a download that is meant to be burned into a CD, so after selecting my download location, I soon started receiving a 690 MB file. It was not even an hour when I finished downloading the file. I was able to make an installer from the downloaded file and after inserting the CD into my laptop, rebooted and wait for what will happen next.

If you have been following the steps that I was doing, now is a great time to pause because a lot of innovative things have been going on in the Linux world. For one, the installer that you just had made is called a LiveCD. This technology is able to a lot of amazing things. For one, while booting up, Ubuntu’s LiveCD autodetects most my computer’s hardware, even the newer stuff like the wifi, bluetooth, even the volume controls on my laptop. In fact, booting up a PC using a LiveCD is the easiest way to find out if your computer runs perfectly on Linux. Perhaps the most amazing thing about the LiveCD is that the Linux operating system that is now powering the computer is not running from the harddisk but is read on demand from the LiveCD.

If you have an MS Windows powered portable or laptop, and you booted using the LiveCD, you will soon find out that instead of the familiar Windows interface, a new Linux desktop is shown on the screen. Thanks to hardware autodetection, the screen resolution looks right and you will notice that although things look different, there are actually many similarities between Ubuntu Desktop and Windows. I noted that there is a menu bar where the first item is named Applications. When I clicked on it, I saw the software that I can launch using the LiveCD.  I myself was wondering if ever I decide to use Linux, will I be able to work as usual, can I write my blog article on an MS Word equivalent and afterwards go online where I can post my  blog? It turns out that, indeed, Ubuntu is able to make me productive using free and familiar software. For office oriented work, Ubuntu makes available the OpenOffice software suite, which means that I can write my blog offline using OpenOffice Write. For web browsing and posting articles I use Firefox.

After finding out that my laptop works fine on Linux, I can now confidentially install Ubuntu on my portable and still be as productive as before. My dilemma was now choosing between working on Linux exclusively or being able to dual boot between Windows and Ubuntu Desktop. I decided that dual booting is the best option for me because I can be productive on free software while being able to boot on Windows is useful for the occasional game that I have to play.

I am sure that you have noticed that when selecting the Shut Down option in the Start menu, the actual command to turn off a laptop is one of at least four options the computer will ask you to select. For this article, these four options are restart, sleep, hibernate and shutdown. If ever there are two other options such as to log off or switch users, these options are not connected to power management. The four options are available to Vista computers and I am not sure what the options are in Windows XP computers.

I carefully read what Windows help has to say about the four options and this is what I found out. Basically, it is the suggestion of Windows that if your laptop will just be on a desk or in your house for a couple of days, to not turn off the computer when you need to sleep or go out of the house but to make it sleep or hibernate. The only time it is necessary to shut down a laptop is when there is a need to access the insides of the computer probably to install a new hard disk or to add additional memory chips. Of course when I see that there are days when I don’t need to access my laptop (which is almost never), Windows help says that it is fine to shut the computer down. I also find it necessary to shut down my computer when I take a long trip, either by car or by plane. I do not really feel comfortable making a computer sleep with all that shaking going on. However, it is mentioned by online help that when a computer sleeps, the hard disk is powered down too so it is not spinning at all. If you feel comfortable letting a laptop sleep while on a long car journey, then I guess it should be fine. I myself have done so on some occasions.

What I do instead when commuting by car or taxi from home to the office is to make my computer hibernate, if it was already on previously. Resuming work from a computer that came from sleep or hibernation is much faster than to resume from a computer that was powered down. Hibernating a computer saves the data and the state of all applications into the hard disk. Then the computer is powered down. Because the state of running applications are saved, the next time the computer is turned on, the previous state of all the application windows has been restored. Making a computer sleep likewise saves both data and state into the hard disk. Afterwards, the hard disk is powered down, stops spinning and the computer enters a low power consumption state. The most commonly accepted way of making a laptop sleep is to close the lid. When the lid is opened, the computer wakes up and I can resume working right away, very much faster than powering on a computer or waking up a hibernating computer.

To fine tune how a computer sleeps or hibernate, just click on Power Options in the Control Panel.

Working on a laptop computer, especially those smaller models entails a lot of sacrifices. These tradeoffs are acceptable because they come with the territory of having a lighter computer that enables me to work anywhere. The complaints I write in this blog are the inconveniences I face because of poor hardware choice or just plain bad design/decision.

Right now, my biggest peeve is that my optical drive selectively reads DVDs but never fails when reading CDs. When I went to the company website of my laptop’s manufacturer, I saw a driver patch for the optical drive for my computer but I was dismayed to find out that it was for another drive model. I did not find a patch for the optical drive of my laptop. At first, I thought it was because I must have played DVDs with different regional codes but when I found out that other similar computers who were only using data DVDs had the same problem, I am very certain that the optical drive in my computer is a poor hardware choice.

Another thing that annoys me is that sometimes my fingers brush the touchpad when I am typing and when it happens, the cursor jumps somewhere on the screen. When it does, the next letter I type is not where I expected it to be but inserted somewhere on the text I typed in earlier. This thing happens a lot to me and I really find it very, very annoying especially when I am up late at night writing.

Overheating is another problem I face but only on rare occasions. I know that there were cases when it was my fault like typing away on the bed thus letting the bed sheets block ventilation holes. But I remember working on a clean table surface and suddenly my computer just died. I could only say that this was a random act but I think that there are some games like Plants vs Zombies that make my computer overheat.

Although I have not yet reached this point, when the time comes for me to change to a bigger hard disk but unable to install the operating system because no installation DVDs came with my laptop package, I am sure that I will be very, very annoyed. When I realized that the backup copy of my Vista was in a hidden partition in my computer’s hard drive, I got mildly annoyed.

Another annoyance that I encounter is when I put my laptop on my lap but the thing gets too hot for comfort. What if there is no alternative surface where I can put my laptop?

Despite of all the irritants that I have encountered, my laptop is still a great piece of equipment. I haven’t turned off my laptop in weeks, I just let it sleep. It works well and is quite fast. In fact, the fastest computers in my office are all laptops and the once speedy desktops are all unused waiting for some kindly soul to adopt them.