As we all know it is important for us to keep our computers in good clean condition, not only for aesthetic reasons but also to maintain good functionality of your equipment and possibly most important of all for health reasons. When it comes to keeping electrical and computer equipment clean it is important to follow a few basic rules.
Cleaning Agents
When it comes to cleaning your computer, you want something that can both clean the computer screen to remove fingerprints and dust without leaving streaks, and you also want something that get all that built up grime off that thing you type on all day, the keyboard. These are the only things you need:
Rubbing Alcohol
Water
Microfiber (or lint free) cloth
Squirter bottle
Towel
Preparation
The mixture of the alcohol and water makes up the cleaning agent – this mixture is important as the alcohol helps to readily dry the liquid mix which is great for computer screens and the alcohol has good anti-bacterial properties.
You will need to mix these two liquids in your squirty bottle in a ratio of 1:1, that is equal parts of each, so for every 100 mls of rubbing alcohol you would add 100 mls of water.
Cleaning your Computer
The first thing to do here is to ensure that all of your equipment has been turned off and preferably disconnected from the power. Once you have done this it is important to remember that the cleaning solution should never be directly squirted onto any of your equipment as this can work its way into the electrical systems and in turn leave you with a faulty machine.
You will want to spray an adequate amount of liquid onto your lint free cloth to moisten it, you can then wipe over all external surfaces of your computer equipment. This mixture will remove greasy fingerprints and also that dirty grime that tends to build up on your keyboard. You may find that to adequately clean stubborn stains that a little extra elbow grease is required.
Laptops
Laptops here do require a little bit of different attention to a standard desktop PC. Given that the screens on a laptop are on a hinge it is important to take care when cleaning them. This is where the towel comes into play, you will need to lay the towel on a flat surface. Open up your laptop and place the computer on the towel with the back of the screen laying flat and support the computer by holding the main body. This is important because if you attempt to clean the screen while it is in it’s normal position you have the change of doing damage to the hinge.
Once it is laid down you are free to wipe over the screen as you would with any other flat surface, and apply the same technique to clean the other flat surfaces on your laptop.
Final Note:
There are computer cleaning sprays available to purhchase, if you choose to use one of these then there is nothing wrong with that. However I feel that the solution described above is probably a much more cost effective way rather than purchasing the commercial cleaning agents. Further to this if you are really serious about keyboard cleanliness for hygiene reasons, a good way to get out all the dirt, dust and crumbs that build up under the keys is to purchase a can of compressed air. This is pressurised air and can be squirted in and around the keys to blow all of that grime away.
Rumours are coming in thick and fast about all sorts of new and refreshed Apple products. It would seem that they may just carry some weight as well. With many rumours about the release of a new iMac to be coming our way seemingly any moment now, it would seem appropriate that a facelift on the iMac would come with new peripherals – wouldn’t it?
AppleInsider mentions in this post on their website a few very notable points which certainly lead to a new release of an iMac, there’s news of supply lines for the current model being restricted. Now in the past when this has been the case with other products such as the iPhone, iPods & Laptops it has almost certainly meant that there’s a new model on the way. To complement this it has been just over two years now since Apple first released the aluminium iMac in it’s current shape, all of these things say to me that it may just be time for an update.
What really catches my eye though is the thought that there may also be new peripherals such as an updated Mighty Mouse and Keyboard to go along with it. Personally I love the aluminum keyboard that was released with the original aluminium iMac. I find it easy and quick to type on, while also being nice and quiet, however I am considerably more excited about the possibility of a new mighty mouse.
Endgadget posted an article the other day about how Apple applied for new patents on the Keyboard and Mighty Mouse, these details were released on the American FCC’s website just long enough for keen eyes to grab some screen shots with pictures and all. I really do find the current Mighty Mouse a great mouse to use, and I think that it complements OS X very well. The ability to use and customise so many different buttons on the mouse in such a user friendly way is something that I seen on many other mice out there to-date. My one and only complaint about the current mouse however is that of the scroll ball. When it works it is genius, but give it some time and some frequent use and this thing gets so gunked up it renders it almost unusable.
The patents that were released seem to hint towards the new mouse containing some sort of multi-touch technology, if this is something that can replace the scroll ball while still maintaining the great user experience then I say bring it on! Given that one of our mighty mouse has a scroll ball that needs cleaning every second day I say that it is definitely time for a new model to come out.
If you are anything like me, it drives me crazy when all I want to do is sync my phone with iTunes and every time I connect it – iPhoto opens. It opens whether there are new photos on my phone or not (thats possibly the most annoying part – please fix this Apple). So I went on a mission to find out how do disable iPhoto from automatically opening when you plug in an iPhone or digital camera. Turns out that it is pretty simple!
Essentially you just need to open iPhoto, select the ‘iPhoto’ menu > Preferences > General Tab > Connecting Camera Options > No Program
This will stop any programs automatically opening when you connect any iPhone or Digital Camera, and allows you to then manually open it when you see fit.
There are other options for doing this, such as using Image Capture. I think they may have taken this out in Snow Leopard 10.6 because I just can’t find it. But presumably in prior versions of OS X you can open Image Capture and follow a similar process to selecting which programs you want your computer to open when connecting a camera.
This is one of the new features that Apple included in iTunes version 9. If you have ever had to import more than a single file into iTunes at a time then I think you need to be aware of this method.
Apple have created a folder called ‘Automatically Add to iTunes’, and any media that you place in this folder will automatically be added to your library and organised in the appropriate way. It really is a shame that they decided to hide this folder away down in the depths of you’re computer because it certainly does make importing files a whole heck of a lot easier.
Just a little thing to be aware of when it comes to putting files into this folder. Don’t be alarmed when they suddenly disappear – it’s ok! What iTunes does it takes the file and puts it within the iTunes library files with all of your other media.
