Once a Year

Best instructions I've yet found re computer cleaning:

Maintaining a Desktop (laptops out side of keeping all air intakes clean there isn't much the average user should try to do)

Once a year we should (few people do) instead we wait perhaps for years until a pesky little problem keeps popping up.

Then as a last resort we do what we should have done a long time ago.

We open up that mysterious box and look in side.

Surprise/Surprise no sign of Merlin or any of his enchanted creatures!

just a bunch of wires plug into some funny looking boxes, shucks there's even miniature house fans in this thing

OK now that we've looked, why did we open this contraption up?

What we want to do is

Make sure a dust bunny isn't shorting out one of the house fans, plus we want to make sure that none of the many connections
hasn't came loose or developed a little bit of corrosion.

Like anything else there are wrong ways to clean your computer, but only one way to do it right.

Desktop computer open in many ways, if you have the manual you're in luck. If you don't have the manual you might have to go to the manufactures web site to find out how to open the case.

Static electricity is your main concern (one zap to your mother board is like breaking a mirror except more expensive)

The static electricity war is a easy one to win, by just a few easy steps!

After you figger out how to open the case but before you start

1 Turn off the power in the power strip (your computer is hooked to a power strip isn't it?)

2 Leave the computer plugged into the power strip, and the power strip plugged into the wall socket
(reason for this) "any static electricity will bleed off through the ground wire"

You will need two simple tools
1 Buy a can of compressed air
2 buy a small real hair paint brush 1/4 to 1/2 wide works just fine (real hair doesn't generate static electricity)

Do not use a vacuum cleaner period! all vacuum cleaners generate static electricity

After the case is open, touch the metal case to get rid of any static electricity you
might be carrying, then perhaps useing a flashlight start looking for dust rabbits, touch them
with the real hair brush and in just a short time you will have collected most or all of them.
pay close attention to the fans and the fan blades. (you might have to use a Q tip
moistened with alcohol to clean the crud from the fan blades)

OK, once the big stuff is gone, grab that can of compressed air and zap everything inside the case that even looks like it might have a bit of dust or cat hair.

Step two is we start checking connections for looseness or corrosion. Most corrosion inside a computer case will be hard or imposable to see.

If you see a bunch of green corrosion when you open the case you have big time problems that only a shop can correct

What you are going to do now is to start unplugging and reconnecting each connection. This simple act will remove any
connection corrosion. Most of the wired plugins will be just a straight pull, some might have small clips that have to be pushed
or pulled before you can separate the connection. Pull from the plugs not the wires, use gentle force if you can't get it loose
leave it!

To start locate the memory chips, either open up your manual or go online to ID them and the correct way to remove them.
If there is a unseen corrosion problem most of the time this is where it will be. remove the chips one at a time and then put it right back in. Memory chips are often difficult to remove even after opening any retaining clips. Use on a straight pull to remove and a straight push to install (no side pressure)

After the memory chips, do only wired connections Do not remove anything item from the motherboard

All done?

Button it up and do a test drive.

If the problem is fixed that's great, if not at least we know what the problem is not!

If you aren't comfortable cleaning your computer, by all means talk to a pro about doing it for you.
Don't ask them to trouble shoot any problems unless you want to spend big bucks for a hourly rate.

Perhaps you might know someone who can do this for you?
(quite often folks who like to work on computers can be tempted to spend hours on a machine by just a plateful of donuts)