Fix It Fast : Thema Paste

Rehabilitate a Misbehaving Monitor

4 minutes: Monitor problems are incredibly frustrating, but they usually aren't difficult to fix. When your screen starts misbehaving, try the simplest solution first: Disconnect and recon­nect your cabling to ensure that all connectors are firmly plugged in. Often that's all it takes.
If the problem persists, a cable or one of the ports on either the monitor or the PC may have degraded; try using a spare cable (or borrow one from a friend); if the monitor still balks, see if using an alternate port (most contemporary monitors and PCs have multiple display ports) solves the problem.
If you still have problems with a blank screen, and your system has a discrete graphics card installed,
it's time to open up the case. Switch off your PC's power, unplug the power cable, and open up the PC case. Reseat the graphics card, and then check to confirm that it's firmly attached to the PCI port. While you have your computer's case open, make sure that all of the cooling fans inside your case are clean and dust-free, especially the ones attached to the graphics card itself. Graphics cards often exhibit weird graphical glitches and color errors when they overheat or are on the verge of failing.

Fix a Malfunctioning Keyboard

1 minute: If you're banging away on your key- board and suddenly you notice that nothing is happening on screen, you probably have a busted keyboard. But before you throw it away in disgust and head off to buy a new one, make sure the prob­lem isn't just a port issue: Unplug the keyboard from your PC, plug it into a different USB port, and see if the nonresponsiveness persists.
If your keyboard doesn't connect via USB, it’s prob­ably an older PS/2 keyboard, and you may need to download the appropriate driver software in order to tell your PC how to understand it. You can find Microsoft's generic PS/2 multimedia keyboard driv­ers at go.pcworld.com/ps2driver.

Allowed Apps:

In this window, you can specify apps that you would like Windows Firewall to permit to access the Web at need.

Therma Paste:

A single drop of thermal paste is all you need to afix a heat sink to a CPU to conduct heat away from the pro­cessor effectively.

Sharply Curtail Long Boot Times

3 minutes: Many PCs take much longer to boot into Windows than they should because they waste time loading a bunch of programs that you don't need at startup. You can switch off most such programs, known as startup services, with little risk. By doing so, you’ll shave precious seconds off your boot time, and you can always launch the pro­grams manually if you want to use them later.
To shut down unnecessary startup services, press the <Windows> key, type Run, and then press <Enter>. In the resulting Run command box, type msconfig to launch the System Configuration utility, and navigate in that utility to the Services tab. There you'll see a list of all of the programs that start up automatically when you boot into Windows. For safety's sake, check the box that says Hide all Micro­soft services before you make any other changes. Then disable every utility that you don't need to have start up automatically. Turn off Adobe Updater and Steam, for example, and run them manually when you want to use them.

Use Thermal Paste to Fix a Too-Hot CPU

4 minutes: If your PC is overheating and you’re comfortable working on its interior, consider replacing the old thermal paste. The ther­mal interface material (or TIM) used between CPUs (and GPUs) and their heat sinks breaks down over
time and becomes less effective at conducting heat away from a PC's components. To replace the thermal paste, carefully remove the heat sink and use isopropyl alcohol (or any other alcohol-based cleaner that won’t leave any residue) to clean the old thermal paste from the base of the heat sink and from the surface of the chip it was mounted on. Once the surfaces are clean, apply a few drops of fresh TIM and remount the heat sink. For de­tailed instructions on how to apply TIM and how to install heat sinks on both AMD and Intel processors, check out our guide to installing a CPU cool­er (go.pcworld.com/cpucooler).

Disable AutoPlay

30 seconds: If you're tired of clicking through the annoying AutoPlay pop-up window every time you plug some­thing into your PC, disable it from within a hidden Windows menu. To do this, first plug the offending device—a camera or smartphone, for example—into your PC and allow the device to install any necessary drivers. Close the AutoPlay window when it pops up, safely disconnect the device, and then plug it back in. When the audacious AutoPlay window pops up again, select View more AutoPlay options in Control Panel. Choosing that option will cause Windows to take you to Control Panel; scroll down the list of rec­ognized devices there to find the latest device, and change the 'Choose a default' option to Take no action. Click Save, and AutoPlay should never trouble you about that specific device again. If you want to switch off AutoPlay completely, select View more AutoPlay options at the top of the screen and disable the Use AutoPlay for all media and devices option.