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Desktop computers are made to be sturdy, reliable, but they occupy a lot of space, and, plus, you cannot take them with you when on a business trip or a vacation. On the other hand, a laptop does all that and even more. A laptop is light - compared to your desktop computer - , its performances are good and you can use it wherever you want. However, there are situations when the laptop can prove to be not so handy.

The main issue is represented by its battery. As they do not need to be plugged in order to work, laptops rely on the energy coming from the battery. So far, most laptops, when in use, consume their batteries in several hours. After that, you have to plug them in again, for recharge. Another great disadvantage is that laptops are easy to steal, as their weight would not encumber a swift thief. But let’s see how you can enjoy your laptop at optimal parameters.

Energy Saving Strategies

As said before, laptops work with batteries that are not fit for long runs. Still, you can enjoy your laptop for a longer time, if you know how to squeeze your battery juice to the fullest. This strategy that we are about to show you can save you a few hours of stress until you reach a place with an outlet where you can recharge the battery.

The laptop screen is the biggest consumer that drains the life out of the battery. So, in case that you do not need a bright screen in order to complete your work, reduce the light and the configuration to the lowest values. This way, you will have more juice in the laptop battery and it will work more than just 6 hours.

Backup, Backup, Backup!

Because of the fact that laptops were designed to be portable and carried around, your chances of dropping your laptop are much greater than knocking over your desktop tower. Because of the sensitivity of hard drives, a good drop on concrete can wreak havoc on your storage drives; a hard drive crash is a nightmare to deal with, believe me. Bearing this in mind, it’s always a good idea to back up your data whenever you can. You can easily shuttle data back and forth via thumb drives or CD-R/DVD. It’s better to be safe than sorry, so be sure to back up your data on your laptop on a regular basis.

Guard Your Laptop

Sharing your files over the Internet is far from being a good idea, if you are interested into keeping your laptop as safe as possible. With a laptop at hand, you can connect to wireless networks, and this can become a gateway for viruses and spywares, in case you do not have installed a reliable firewall, like ZoneAlarm.

Because of the compact size of laptops, they’re really easy to steal, so always know your laptop’s whereabouts. Encrypting your laptop’s hard drive can give you peace of mind; if your laptop gets stolen, as least the files residing on your hard drive are encrypted and cannot easily be viewed or accessed.

Stay Away from the Heat

Another thing about laptops that can become quite annoying is that they tend to heat up after just a few hours. It is not at all pleasant to keep a hot item on your knees while outside is summer, so, if you did not buy special laptop sleeves, find any piece of clothing that can keep the heat from the laptop off your body.

The comfort factor is hard to take from laptops. No matter how fast desktop computers change in order to become more flexible, they still have a lot ahead if they want to catch laptops from behind. Even with an LCD screen, there is no way for a desktop computer to occupy less space than a laptop. By applying some of the suggestions above, you will have more reasons to enjoy your laptop as you should.