Tips to maintain your PC, router, and more

Maintaining your home office tech is just as important as maintaining your garden or your car, but we often zoom right past it in the rush to get the next task done. Don’t do that. We’ve compiled a list of to-do items for you to check off to keep you, your PC, and other devices running smoothly.

There’s an economical side to this, too. In certain situations, working from home effectively may mean buying new equipment to fill the gaps. But before you decide you need something new, making the most of what you already have might be a better idea.

The device everyone forgets about: the router

As with our work-from-home tips guide (see page 17 ), we’re not going to begin with the PC, as it’s the most familiar, most easily maintained device. Instead, we’re focusing first on a device that very often gets ignored: your home router.

Note that the advice below applies to users who have purchased their own router. If you have a router leased to you by your ISP, you could tweak those settings as we’re about to describe. But even though your ISP