Presentation On

PC Diagnostic, Testing, Maintenance and Tools.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 1

Preventive Maintenance
No matter how
good the
configuration of
your PC may be, if
you don’t take care
of it, it is bound to
slow down soon and
gradually drift
towards failure.
Just like all other
appliances you
own, it is essential
for you to perform
regular preventive
maintenance of
your PC.
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 2
 Preventive Maintenance
 The measures taken to keep equipment working and/or
extend the life of the equipment is called Preventive
Maintenance (PM).
 It is named so because, the measures taken prevent the
failure before it actually occurs.
 By Ensuring Long Life for your PC, it reduces the chances
of Problem Behavior and undesired Data Loss.
 There are two types of PM, Active PM, Passive PM and
Periodic PM.
 Active PM basically involves measures like periodic
cleaning of the system and its components
 Passive PM involves steps to protect the system and its
components from the environment
 Periodic PM includes few tasks the user must perform
after certain intervals say weekly, monthly, etc.
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 3
 Active Preventive Maintenance
 It may interest you that, lesser the Passive PM you do, more
the amount of Active PM you have to do, and vice versa.
 When not cleaned for a long time minute foreign bodies
particularly dust gets accumulated inside various components
of the PC like the CPU, Keyboard, Printer, etc.
 This can become a cause of improper operation of the
particular component.
 Also, Dust acts as a thermal insulator, this prevents proper
system cooling. Excessive heat reduces the component’s life.
 A regular cleaning of the system removes any layers of dust &
foreign particles. Thus, keeping the above problems at bay.
 The tools which could be used for Active PM include Wrist
Grounding Strap, Air Blowers, Eraser, Canned Air, Small
Brushes, Foam Tape wid solutions like Acetone, Isopropyl
Alcohol, Trichloroethane, Freon,etc.
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 4
 Passive Preventive Maintenance
 Passive Preventive Maintenance involves taking care of the
system from physical environment and electrical problems.
 Physical Conditions such as temperature, thermal stress
from power cycling, dust, and air pollution, and
disturbances such as shock and vibration.
 Electrical Problems are things such as Mains Fluctuations
(use UPS), Power Line Noise (use RFC), ESD and RFI.
 Thermal expansion and contraction from excessive
temperature changes place stress on the components of
computer system. So, to provide the computer the right
temperature, one must choose cooling/heating solutions
depending on the ambient temperature of that area.
 For preventing dust and air pollution it is advised to have air
con in the computer room, and AVOID smoking near the PC.
 Never allow any PC component to get subjected to shocks
or vibration especially when it is ‘ON’.
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 5
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 6
 Periodic Maintenance Procedure
 Periodic Maintenance includes few tasks the user must
perform after certain fixed intervals of time.
 Tasks to be Performed Weekly:
 Check for and install antivirus updates.
 Defragment the Hard Disk.
 Delete all Temporary Files such as *.temp, ~*.*, *.chk
 Empty the Recycle Bin.
 Backup Important Data onto the internet, pen drive etc.
 Tasks to be Performed Monthly:
 Create System Restore Point.
 Check for and install any Operating system updates.
 Check whether everything is working properly and in good
condition.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 7

 Preventive Maintenance of HDD

 Take backup and format the HDD at least once a year

and reinstall all software to maintain disk efficiency and
speed.
 Format the drive in the position and at the temperature
it will be used.
 Make periodic backup of your data and critical areas,
such as MBR, VBR, FAT, and root directory on the disk.
 Provide good surge protection (Spike Guard) or UPS.
 Do not keep HDD or CPU near the vibration area.
 Ensure fitting of HDD, that the disk is fully secured and
well supported in the CPU cabinet.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 8

Preventive Maintenance of Monitor
 Switch off the monitor before switching off the
mains.
 Before switching on the mains ensure that power
switch of the monitor is in the off position.
 Use dust cover for monitor when it is off.
 Regularly, Clean the display screen without allowing
any water to go in.
 Do not put monitor near strong magnetic field, which
may cause improper deflection.
 Provide proper ventilation for heat dissipation to
avoid intermittent failures.
 DO NOT PUT paper or any thing else on top of the
monitor.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 9

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 10
Preventive Maintenance of Keyboard
 Press the keys gently and do not rest your hands on
the keyboard.
 Don’t keep anything on the keyboard.
 Don’t play with the keyboard after powering off the
system.
 Don’t spill any liquids on the keyboard.
 Use dust cover for keyboard when not in use.
 Clean interior of keyboard with a miniature vacuum
cleaner or turn it upside down to blow out the dirt.
 Clean conducting parts of keyboard with denatured
alcohol and lint free material
 Make sure that the cable is not subjected to high
stress at the keyboard end else the signal wires
might snap.
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 11
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 12
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 13
 Preventive Maintenance of Printer
 Use dust cover for printer when not in use.
 Clean the exterior of printer of printer using soft cloth
with mild organic solvent.
 Clean out dust, paper fragments and dirt from its
mechanism using soft brush.
 Check that the paper feed path is free of obstructions.
 Clean the paper feed path, platen and ribbon path (in dot
matrix type) with soft cloth.
 Lubricate mechanical parts.
 Use quality ribbon to avoid damage to print head.
 Don’t place the printer close to any heat generating
machine such as heater, fire place, etc.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 14

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 15
 Keyboard - Problems and Causes
o Complete non-operation: Broken connection, Keyboard
lock is not unlocked, problem with keyboard socket.
o Wrong Characters Displayed: Bad Keyboard cable,
Problem with row decoder or column decode logic,
misalignment of sheets (if membrane type).
o One or Few keys don’t work: Keys are bad, Dust
accumulation, Broken contacts, dry soldering, loose
contact, etc. on circuit board.
o Unwanted Repeat Action: Bad key, Bad interfacing
cable, Bad keyboard Controller.
o Characters remain in upper or lower case: Bad caps
lock key, bad shift key, bad keyboard controller.
o Key being sticky or difficult to press: Accumulation of
dirt.
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 16
 Mouse - Problems and Causes

o Mouse not working: Bad mouse cable, problem with

mouse port, IRQ Conflicts, Motherboard Malfunction.
o Mouse works only in particular directions: Wrong
software setup, Dust Accumulation, Fault in one set of
roller sensors.
o One or Few Buttons don’t work: Buttons are bad,
Dust accumulation, Broken contacts, Dry soldering.
o Mouse movement bumpy, irregular or uneven:
Excessive accumulation of foreign particles inside the
mouse, Wrong setup of driver, improper configuration
settings such as pointer speed, mouse acceleration, etc.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 17

 Electrostatic Discharge (ESD)
 Electrostatic discharge (ESD) is the sudden and momentary
electric current that flows between two objects at different electrical
potentials. The term is usually used to describe momentary
unwanted currents that may cause damage to electronic equipment
(pc components).
 Our body accumulates static charges up to 25,000 Volts!
They look for a discharging path offering shortest resistance.
 The body offers considerable resistance, so they don’t discharge
through it. But when we comes into contact with any electronic
equipment, its circuitry often provides a very low resistance path to
ground, so a heavy discharging current flows, which may damage
the equipment.
 Protection Measures: Earthing, wear ground strap on wrist, put
anti-static mat near pc, anti-static protective tubes & bags,
periodically touch unpainted metal, handle ics without touching
their pins, initially touch a grounded area.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 18

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 19
 Radio Frequency Interference(RFI)
 The unintended reception of RF waves leads to a
phenomenon known as RFI. Nearly every electronic device is
subject to radio frequency (RF) interference from external
sources if inadequately shielded, designed, or otherwise
configured to be compatible (use of RFCs).
 The RFI is caused due to a source of RF transmission near
PC. Interference of 10khz + radiations is termed as RFI.
 The sources which could cause RFI are:
- Cell Phones -Cordless Phones
- Motors -High Speed Digital Circuits
- Television Reciever
- Wireless PC Peripherals (keyboard, mouse,etc.)
- Power Line Communication.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 20

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 21
 Logic Probe.
 A logic probe is a hand-held pen-like probe used for analyzing
and troubleshooting the logical states (boolean 0 or 1) of a
digital circuit.
 It can be used on either TTL (transistor-transistor logic) or
CMOS (complementary metallic oxide semiconductor)
integrated circuit devices.
 In digital circuits many signals oscillate very rapidly, so the
simple voltmeter becomes useless. So, for testing and
troubleshooting them, we use a logic probe.
 The pulse detecting electronics usually has a "pulse stretcher"
circuit so that even very short pulses become visible.
 There are usually 3 different LEDs on the probe's chassis; A red
and green LED indicate high and low states respectively, An
amber LED indicates a pulse.
 Using the probe we can determine whether the clock circuit is
operating & whether other signals are present or not.
 Logic probes can monitor only 1 line at a time.
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 22
 Block Diagram of Logic Probe

Pulse Detector Pulse

& Stretcher I/p

Red (High)
I/p
Amplifier Comparator Green (Low)

Amber (Pulse)

Vref
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 23
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 24
 Logic Pulsar.
 It is used to inject pulses into a digital circuit and even
for applying particular logic levels.
 It is used to test circuit reaction to particular logic levels
applied at particular points.
 Logic probe and pulser are generally used together to test
ICs by verifying the truth table.
 Example: Inverter testing
 It has a unique ability to introduce a changing signal into
circuit without breaking any tracks or desoldering
anything.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 25

 Block Diagram of Logic Pulser

+5V

Pulse O/p O/p

Multivibrator
Generator Stage

Gnd
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 26
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 27
Current Tracer
 Current tracer is a device having special ability to
check whether current is flowing in a particular
branch without altering the circuit conditions.
 It works on the principle of electromagnetic
induction.
 It has a coil in it, which gets induced with emf by
the magnetic field, which gets produced due to the
flow of current.
 It is useful in locating shorted components, track
shorts, etc.
 In the figure, we want to check whether gate B has
shorted inputs.
 The line is pulsed using the Logic Pulser, if the input
is ground then heavy current will flow which will be
sensed by current tracer and its LED will glow.
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 28
Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 29
End of Presentation.

Prashant Serai, P14, V.E.S.P 30