Untitled Document

Common Maintenance can significantly improve the migration process.

It is common for systems to be used on a daily basis and with the best intentions, we plan on a good maintenance program, but the daily grind overtakes our best intentions.

Common tasks like scheduling OS system and software updates, checking for patches, using the virus protection software to scan for viruses, etc., can be inconvenient and commonly are pushed out to a different time. These types of tasks can often improve our performance and after many months or years of neglect are like forgetting to put oil in our car. They are easy to perform and very appropriate to mentally "clean out the garage" before migrating to our new machines. The "garage cleaning" can be broken down into a couple of common groups that will be easy to understand.

These programs are run through the accessories menu under programs. They are free and will commonly take a little time to perform, so many will start the process when they have a couple hours to leave and come back to finish up with the results. Disk clean-up, or scan disk on older systems should be performed first to ensure we correct any errors that are found on the drive, empty . The disk Defragmentor will gather all of the files that have been scattered across the drive and clean them up to put order back into accessing the hard drive and improve performance. This will greatly improve the migration as well. Other utility tools perform similar functions and are commonly included in virus protection software. These utilities usually are a little more thorough but are not freely included in the Operating System tools.

It is also recommended to visit Microsoft and other software publishers for any updates that may be appropriate for your programs. Microsoft will commonly release service packs that update and correct security flaws in the software. Many times these will break dependencies created by other programs or make programs work better. They can be reached at:

Utility tools by other software vendors.
The other main maintenance that is important to perform is to update the virus protection software to the latest version and perform a thorough scan of your hard drive. This will ensure you have the latest version to capture any viruses and ensure you are moving "clean" data.

Most migrations ask that you interrupt any other applications that are running prior to using migration software and virus protection software is usually included in this list. It is prudent to perform this maintenance just prior to migrating so any viruses will be detected and quarantined on the old system. The migration can be interrupted by the virus protection software and should be disabled during the migration. The virus protection software should be enabled after the migration is complete and especially prior to downloading anything from the internet, especially mail on your new system.

General recommendations that the user can do.
Many other area's can include files and excess data that we would not choose to bring to the new computer. Temporary files are famous places to hold duplicate data that is not needed in our new environment.

The biggest culprit is usually saved mail and especially junk mail. We can delete this prior to moving, by going through all of the folders on our email. A good rule of thumb is to delete anything that you have not accessed over the last 3 months. Many times we save important email for our records and I would not recommend deleting anything that has a significant value for your records, like emails on work items, permission from your college compliance officer on interpreting rules violations with the NCAA if you choose to gamble, without losing your job, or anything else that you would think you should keep as proof of communication or a personal record in our electronic data files. Many people also unknowingly save every email they have ever sent in the sent folders on their mailbox. This would also be a good area to consider eliminating to reduce clutter and promote a fresh start on a new machine.

Surfing the internet can capture large amounts of data and many times we do not realize we are bringing them along. Most internet browsers have settings that capture files and cookies from places we have viewed on our machine. Many times we have bookmarked these places to keep for future reference, other times we unknowingly drag this information along with us. The best way to "unhitch the trailer" is to delete the Internet cache, delete cookies and delete any off-line files. These can take up a lot of room and are usually things we would not choose to migrate knowingly.

These simple tasks can greatly improve your migration experience and give you peace of mind in knowing that the "garage" is free of the garbage and all of the stuff left over is truly valuable to you.