How to handle an aging computer
Is your work computer ready for the antiques market? CARYN ROUSSEAU asks computer experts how to get the most from your Paleozoic PC.>
Not everyone gets to work at Google on brand new MacBook Pros with enough RAM to power Abu Dhabi. Some schlep to work and sit down in front of an aging PC, praying that it will just make it through the day.
So whether it takes forever to start up in the morning, or if Internet videos make it crumble and crash, just how do you combat old PC meltdown?
Just ask for a new one, right?
Yeah, right.
We've asked computer experts how to maximize the limited potential of your prehistoric desktop (including how to speak the language of your IT department).
Boot me up, Scottie: What if your computer takes forever to boot up?
"It could be a whole lot of different things. It could be the age of the computer. It could be it needs more memory. It could be you're loading a whole lot of different programs," says Priscilla Alden, assistant vice chancellor for information technology services user support and engagement at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.
Her advice is to check your task bar and delete any programs that aren't used regularly.
Rise of the slower surfer: It's taking forever for the Internet to load. How can I speed it up?
"You can go in and clear you cache and clear your history settings and clear your cookies," Alden says. The cache is supposed to speed up your computer, she says, but it doesn't always work that way.
John Weber, assistant vice president of information technology at Southeast Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau, suggests checking your computer's Internet connection speed. "You'll only get information at the rate that you can pipe it into your machine," he says.
More tips from Weber: Make sure your have good virus protection. Get rid of spyware. Add more memory to older machines if you can. Defragment your hard drive. Empty the recycling bin. Delete unnecessary programs -- what he calls crapware.
"If you have an older machine make sure you take off what you don't need," Weber said. "All that stuff's gotta go. When the computer boots up, a lot of those programs run in the background --whether you know it or not."
And if none of that made any sense to you, try asking ...
Tech support: How can I best communicate my problems to my company's tech support workers?
"The first thing a lot of tech support people are going to do is say, 'Is this real or is this perception?' The other thing that could be really, really helpful is, 'What are the symptoms of it?' Is it taking a long time to boot up and can I quantify that?"
Yes, but I don't understand the words the tech support workers are using. What can I say to them?
"They are kind of cryptic and a lot of them are acronyms," Alden says. She compares it to talking with your auto mechanic. "You don't say the carburetor is clogged. You say it's sputtering.
"Usually users can communicate to the tech person what's going on without using a technical phrase. It's better to describe symptoms rather than the solution. Describe what you were doing when you had the problem."
Weber's final advice: Write down any error messages that pop up.
Golden oldie: Why would I have an older computer anyway?
"There's always the difference between economics versus what the company would like to provide. It could be that you're stuck with an old computer for a while," Alden says. Companies often will see what jobs their employees need to accomplish, how much computer power they need to do those jobs and then distribute the computers from there, she said.