Keeping 1 yr old build in good shape?

Well about every six months or so I make it a ritual to clean away and dust from the water cooling loop radiator and all the fans of the system.

And also remove the Graphics card I have and clean it free from dust that gets trapped in the cooling fins of the cards cooling solutions.

I do this with a small clean Paint brush with soft hairs on it.
I even go to the point of cleaning the dust filters.
And also flipping the PSU upside down if the fan of the unit is facing the base of the system case Novakane.

Then for the rest of the system and any gaps between the hard disk mounting bay clean it also with a small soft tipped paint brush.

For the system it`s self in respect to keeping windows OS running as quickly as it can.
Scan it for malware, and for any viruses.

Also for your main drive that has the working Os installed on in.

Right click on the C: drive and do a disk clean up, as windows error reports and log files plus temporary internet file storage all end up taking up Gb of hard drive space after just a few months of using the system from day to day.
Novakane.

The other space hog of the C: drive is often the amount of backup and restore points made by windows it`s self.
As it creates a new restore point after each new bit of software, or change to windows os is made.

You can do this by right clicking on your C:\ drive in windows file explorer.
And then scrolling down to properties for the drive from the pull down menu you see.

In the Main box simply tick each box where you want the data wiped and cleaned to gain more free storage space on your C:\ drive be it a HDD or SSD drive.
You will also see the more options Tab.

By clicking on it, it is where do wipe or delete all of the old Restore points made by windows.
Keeping only the last one made to also gain more free space.

NB: Never defragment a SSD drive also it does not need to be.
But for Mechanical based drives, or the Hybrid type of drives such as SSHD drives it is ok to do.

You can also edit the windows system configuration to do with the booting of windows.

To access it, click on the start button of windows.
In the search box type: MSCONFIG.
Then press enter.
Click on the startup tab.

What you see is a list of programs and apps set to auto run after windows os has reached windows desktop.
If you want to reduce the time it takes windows to settle down.
Or to gain some more free system memory.

Simply untick any of the check boxes then Apply, and ok.
Then restart your system for the changes to take effect.

There are many programs that when you install them auto set them to launch or run right after windows hits the desktop display.
And lots of them you simply never use, where they as said will sit in the system tray of windows just taking up system memory Novakane.

That is a sheer waste of system resources.
So it`s a good idea to always check this as a tip to keep the system running fast and smooth, while saving free system memory for other tasks you run.

Phew I`m worn out now. Lol.

Anyway It will all keep your system in tip top condition, and keep it nice and fast and responsive at all times.
And a few years down the line Novakane.

All the best, Happy Christmas !