How to Maintain a Mac

Like any home computer, your Mac running OS X needs periodic maintenance. There are some utilities built into OS X that you should run periodically. There are also commercial applications you can use to maintain it.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

Run Mac Maintenance Tools on Mac OS X

1. Run maintenance scripts to maintain your Mac. These are built into your OS and will run automatically if you leave your system on all the time. If you shut your system down every day, remember to run the appropriate Mac maintenance scripts on a daily, weekly and monthly basis.
2. Check your hard drive periodically. This can be done from your Disk Utility on your hard drive, or you can boot up from your install CD and run the Disk Utility from there. You will need it anyway should the utility need to repair your hard drive.
3. Back up your files. You can back up as often as you feel you need to--some people back up daily. In the event of a hard drive crash, you will have a separate copy of all your files. Most users do this with an external hard drive.
4. Repair permissions to maintain your computer. You really only need to do this after you install any new software or before you clone your hard drive. The Mac was designed to be low maintenance.
5. Reinstall when necessary. If you are running OS X 10.2 or higher, use the feature called "Archive and Install." It will move your system files into a "Previous System" folder and reinstall your OS. Do this only when you have tried other measures and only after you back up any files you want to keep.
6. Create a backup of your hard drive on an external Firewire drive.

Tips & Warnings

• Remember to keep the outside of your Mac maintained too. Dust it regularly and clean your screen with a screen wipe.
• Do not over-maintain your Mac. It is possible to do harm to your computer by deleting the wrong files. If you want a comprehensive maintenance tool, Disk Warrior and OnyX are two that are popular among OS X users (see Resources below).

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