Routine Maintenance

Although the focus of this chapter is preventive maintenance, routine maintenance for computers and network devices needs to be performed on a regular basis. Routine maintenance helps prevent hardware failures due to fatigued or old equipment that breaks down. For example, although all computers, from the small desktop to the large rack-mounted systems, use fans to ensure the smooth flow of air through the system to keep components from overheating, you should periodically make sure that dust and other contaminants are not being sucked into the system, where electrical charges can cause them to adhere to system components.

Opening the system box and using canned compressed air to get rid of this kind of contamination can be a good preventive technique to use once or twice a year. If you have a home office, this is easily overlooked. If you have a smoker at home, for example, you'll find that cigarette smoke can produce a fine layer of dust on computer components over time. This can also happen, as I know from experience, with cat hair. Don't leave the box closed forever. Open it up and look inside now and then to clean things up. Even the larger servers that are stored away in a locked computer room can use cleaning now and then. No matter how "clean" you think your computer room is, just take a look at the dust that accumulates over time inside your servers. You might be surprised. This is one of the problems associated with the "lights out" computer-room scenario. If you don't look into the computer room now and then, you may have a problem slowly accumulating. It's always best to find a problem before it seriously impacts your hardware.

Tape drives need to be cleaned periodically because the magnetic tape comes in contact with the tape heads inside the unit. A cleaning tape should be run on a schedule recommended by the manufacturer. DLT tape drives usually have an indicator light that comes on when a sufficient amount of contamination has accumulated on the tape head such that parity errors are occurring. If the cleaning tape light comes on more frequently than the cleaning schedule recommended by the manufacturer, you might want to consider looking at which backup tapes were used just before this happened. You might have an old tape that needs to be discarded, or even a tape drive that needs to be recalibrated or replaced.