Take This Precaution Before Working On Your Computer!

If youre going to open up your personal computer case to check some computer hardware components or clean up the hardware you must take the precautions listed. Computer motherboards and components, such as the sound card, video card, and memory, contain very delicate Integrated Circuit (IC) chips. It is necessary to protect computers against damage from static electricity. A brief explanation of static is its a major contributing factor in the breakdown of computers. Eliminating the damage from ESD (Electrostatic Discharge) can save a lot of money. Here are some things you must remember and precautions to follow whenever you work on your computer.

1. Unplug your computer when working on the inside or well known inside of central processing unit (CPU). You must unplug the power cord to ensure that there is no power to the motherboard.

2. Since there are capacitors in the computer which can store a charge for short periods of time, it is a good idea to wait a few minutes after unplugging the power cord before working on the computer.

3. Use a grounded wrist strap before handling computer components such as the video card, memory, hard disk, and etc. if you do not have one, touch both of your hands to a safely grounded object or to a metal object, such as the power supply case to prevent a discharge from your body to the component.

4. Try not to touch the chips, wires, capacitors or circuitry by holding circuit boards by the edges to avoid static discharge damage.

5. If you are going to remove components from the system, connect up an anti-static mat or use the bag the component came in to place them on and prevent static discharge. Also be aware the hard drive is heavy and can easily slip out of your hand and if dropped may very well not work again.

6. Dont ever touch the non-serviceable. When you come across labels that say “No serviceable components inside” don’t take it as a challenge because its a serious statement. Remember some parts of a computer are just not meant to repaired and this label is usually seen on the power supply which isn’t a good idea to try to repair. Replacement is best.

Remember that you are responsible for protecting yourself from injuries and from causing damage to your computer. A common incident is loss of stored data due to a hard drive crash. These are some simple things to remember that will protect you, your computer and most of all the data stored on your computer.