The technology of today far exceeds what many thought possible, and it’s starting to resemble a sci fi story in places. However, even some age old problems have yet to be solved, and that means that your reliance on technology needs to be paired with a passing knowledge of how to keep your tech operating at maximum efficiency. Here’s what you need to know in order to get the most out of your tech.
Surges and Outages
Your top of the line, start of the art PC won’t mean a whole lot in the event of a power outage, and a power surge can outright destroy some of the more essential components of many modern electronics. These problems are literal forces of nature, and they won’t be going anywhere anytime soon. This means that you’ll need to protect yourself against these forces in a couple of essential ways. If you work from home, for example, and you can’t afford to be without the use of your computer during an outage, consider investing in a UPS power supply so that your PC can keep running through thick and thin for up to 5 years. In the event of a power surge, you’re going to need to ensure that your most integral tech, such as your PC are plugged into outlets that are both grounded and surge protected. This will give your devices the most room to breathe, so to speak, so that excess electricity is rerouted and dispersed with minimal damage to your property.
Malware
The eternal scourge of the internet, malware is very much alive and well. These days, search engines like Google are doing their part to protect internet users by prioritizing secure websites over unsecure sites in search results. This is crucial, because unsecure websites can more easily be hacked, and that can result in an otherwise innocuous site becoming a hotbed for malware and other cyber threats. However, you can still find these sites, so you need to keep an eye out for the warning signs of unsecure sites. First and foremost, the practice of actively marking unsecure sites as such as catching on. However, you can always trust a website’s URL to give them away. Always make sure that the websites are marked “https,” because that “s” represents the additional layer of security that is its encryption and decryption protocol. If a URL starts with “http,” then it’s unsecured and a potential liability, and you probably shouldn’t hang around.
However, you can’t have your guard up 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, so you’ll need to protect you from yourself. By installing antimalware, you can all but guarantee that unwittingly downloading a virus won’t be able to do too much damage. That being said, antimalware isn’t perfect. Hackers are constantly trying to outsmart the entire field of cybersecurity, so the software is sometimes woefully incomplete and waiting for a solution to that particular problem. That means that antimalware software is both utterly invaluable and not a substitute for best practices.
Maintenance
The more complex a machine is, the more it degrades with use. Technology notoriously ages quite poorly because of this and because of how rapidly the field of technology advances. In order to beat the former problem, you’ll need to routinely inspect your PC’s component parts and have them repaired or replaced as needed. However, the latter problem is a bit trickier. Instead of replacing a component because it is broken, you may need to replace parts that are no longer keeping up with modern software, for example. By doing this, you can extend the life of a piece of tech, but it’s not always applicable. For one thing, many devices are manufactured in such a way that they can’t be upgraded, and sometimes they can’t even be tampered with in an easy or intuitive way. On the other hand, even PC’s can have a hard limit in terms of power without replacing the motherboard periodically.