How often does your business maintain its Information Technology systems? Do you clean out the fans every month, or just when the systems are noticeably dirty? Are your storage drive replacements done on a regular schedule, or do you have a plan for removing devices that fail more than once? Every business has different budget and efficiency needs when it comes to maintaining their computer and server systems, and a few of these details can help you figure out how to best organize your business IT maintenance planning.

Power Supply Unit Maintenance

The power supply unit is an entry level to tech maintenance because of its ratio of importance versus ease of replacement. A power supply is required to distribute power throughout a system at all, but the units are fairly simple to replace and often quite affordable. The risk is more about corrupting files or damaging hardware during an unplanned outage.

Most power supply maintenance plans revolve around cleaning. Since power supplies have their own vent and fan systems separate from the computer at large, there is a different, focused collection of dust that must be cleaned away.

For home users, it's fine to just brush the dust off while the system is off. Business systems, however, need to shut down the system and perform closer maintenance. This includes brushing off the outer dust as well as taking the power supply unit apart and cleaning out the dust on the inside.

In addition to cleaning the power supply unit, you need to check the switches and cables. There is an on/off switch and a voltage-changing switch, and the cable needs to be checked for melting and burning.

Storage Drive Maintenance

Storage drives are the most valuable asset in most IT systems. For businesses operating file servers, all of your information is stored on these rectangular drives, and for every other computer, the storage drive is what contains all of the information used to operate the system in a usable fashion.

Whether you're using solid state drives (SSDs) or hard disk drives (HDDs or simply hard drives), there is wear and tear that comes from constantly reading and writing information. Every drive technology, brand name, and product line has a certain hardware life expectancy, and you may need to replace the drives after a couple of years.

You need to do more than swap out the drives as they fail. Chart the brand, product line, purpose, and age of the drive in order to figure out which parts are performing well over long-term use. Contact a CMMS software professional to discuss Computerized Maintenance Management Systems that can organize your maintenance needs for better tasking and future parts purchases.