Savannah is working on a grammar school science fair project and asks:  “Can a computer work in oil?”  Well Savannah, as long as the computer doesn’t get wet with water it should work when submerged in oil.  There are parts of a computer which can’t be submerged in any liquid so you should be careful of that. 

Pure oil – whether it’s vegetable, motor, or mineral oil – contains no water and therefore will not short circuit the delicate electronic components in a computer.  As long as the motherboard and components on it are dunked then the computer should work flawlessly.  The motherboard holds the processor, memory and sometimes a video card.  Each of these will probably run much better when in an oil bath.

Components like the hard drive and CD ROM drive probably shouldn’t be put under the oil because of the moving parts inside each.  The hard drive requires continuous movement so it can read and write data at a fast rate.  CD ROM drives have a laser built in which may be thrown off by the oil.  The power supply could, in theory, be submerged but I don’t know of any benefit.

Many custom computer builders already manufacture computers in oil baths for enhanced performance.  Special kits can cost hundreds of dollars; however, for your experiment I would suggest purchasing a large plastic tub (similar to a plastic storage container).  Your Mom can buy gallons of vegetable oil rather inexpensively at BJ’s or Costco.

I talked with your Mom regarding this project and I will supply a working computer you can use for your project.  If you would like to stop in the store for a couple hours this week with your Mom I would be happy to show you how it works.  I will make plans with your mother to setup the computer both at my store, at your house, and at the science fair.  Please keep in contact through e-mail and phone and I look forward to seeing your results.

Jesse is concerned that her computer may be running slow because of too much data:  “If I remove the pictures from my hard drive will it speed up?”  Jesse, I have some bad news for you.  It will speed up your computer only negligibly; however, there are a few things you can do to make your computer faster.

Pictures only take up space on your hard drive which does not affect read/write times.  Let me rephrase that.  The benefit of removing all your pictures and data will be virtually unnoticeable.  Hard drives and the operating system work hand-in-hand.  Windows creates a ‘map’ of where the data is located on the drive and seeks it out.

Some things you can do on your own to change the speed of your computer are to run disk defragmenter (defrag).  A defrag will reallocate free space, making your data seek times much faster.  Another thing you can do is to use the msconfig command and turn off startup items which aren’t necessary.  I believe the msconfig command to be almost more beneficial than any other for speeding up your computer.

I would not invest in any of the software packages advertised on radio or late night television.  Those packages aren’t very helpful and in some cases create more problems than they fix.  We have had more than one customer in the shop with damaged operating systems caused from snake oil shams.

Tech-Tip of the week:  You can save money on LCD screen wipes by spraying a little blue window cleaner on a terry cloth towel and wiping your LCD screen.  Remember to never spray the screen directly as it may do permanent damage.

(Jeromy Patriquin is the President of Laptop & Computer Repair, Inc. located at 509 Main St. in Gardner.  You can e-mail him at Jeromy@LocalComputerWiz.com or call him directly at (978) 919-8059.)