Repair best practices
These are the repair practices that I follow and recommend:
Blow and/or vacuum dust and dirt from interior of system and power supply case.
Replace missing hardware.
Ensure that components are solidly fastened.
When replacing CPU, apply heat conductive paste to interface with heat sink and ascertain that heat sink is firmly clamped to CPU.
Dress ribbon cables so that they don't impede interior air flow.
Clean or replace air filters.
Lubricate or replace stuck or slow fans. Ball bearing fans have longer MTBFs than cheap sleeve bushing fans, but are a bit noisier.
Replace plenums, heat sinks, and covers, and replace all case fasteners.
Test with user's production peripherals.
Follow good documentation practices so that the next person will know what you've done:
Create a -readme.txt file on repaired system.
Document repair with date, your name, your organization, and what was repaired.
Place driver software in \drivers\ or /bin/drivers/ subdirectories.
Clearly title new directories with descriptive names.
Prepend date, name, change, limits, and reason for change text to any changed configuration files.
If you must do something unusual, clearly document what you did and why you did it, and when you did it.
Make a habit of following these practices
It requires a few more minutes to document and fasten everything securely, but you'll be proud to sign your name to the repair. Better still . . . your users will be happy!
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