On 27 Mar 99, at 21:13, Elizabeth Boston wrote:

> I hope you all are having a nice weekend.
>
>         I live in an area where many residents spend half the year here
> and the other half in warmer climates. Recently one such resident
> contacted me, wanting to know if there was anything they should do to rest
> their computer, scanner and printer for the 5 month period of time that
> they will be away.
>         Does anyone have any suggestions?

  Four concerns spring to my mind:

1.  If the modem phone line doesn't go through a surge-suppressor,
power strikes (lightning, etc.) can travel along the phone line and
damage the modem (and perhaps other components) even when the machine
is turned off.  If there isn't a surge suppressor on the phone
connection, I'd unplug it.

2.  It's possible that the CMOS/RTC battery could run out of juice
while they're away.  My recommendation is to make a bootable floppy
(doesn't have to be the OS they normally run -- could even be DOS) with
a utility to save/restore CMOS values, and back up their current CMOS
to this disk before they leave.  Multiple copies might be a good idea,
too.  This disk will let them boot the machine and restore the CMOS
data when they return, in case it has been lost.

3.  On return, it might be a good idea to open the case and vaccuum out
the dust before applying power.  I'm not sure how the accumulation of
dust when not on differs from when on -- there are arguments both ways.

4.  When a used hard drive sits for a while, it's possible to get some
congealing of the bearing lubricant, and so it may need a bit of extra
power to start turning again.  So the first cold boot on return may not
work.  Odds are pretty good that a couple of warm boots will do the
trick, and once it has run for a little while it should be back to
normal.

David G

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