Preventative Maint on a laptop before Iraq?

Im headed back to Iraq in a few months and was planning on bringing my laptop with me. Its a fairly cheap one (P4 1.5 w/ 256 megs of ram) that Ive had for about 2 years and Im not too concerned if I end up damaging or even ruining it while over there (oddly enough, theres an absurd amount of dust in the desert that gets into everything, whod have thunk it!), but I wanted to at least ensure that its physically in good shape before I leave to try to set myself up for success as much as possible.

Any suggestions on what all I should do, other than bringing along a can of pressurize air to clean it out weekly? Is it worth it to bring it someplace to have them do an "over haul" of it before I leave? Oh, and Im strictly referring to the physical aspects of it. The software part will be saved for a whole separate thread.

Thanks in advance
-Mark

 

Theres not a whole lot you can do physically. I'd familiarize yourself with reseating the RAM should it be jarred loose somhow, and possibly check out the different connections inside, like the hard drive cable and whatnot, however if it is working fine now, you've nothing to worry about.

I wish you a safe stay and return from Iraq!

 

i dunno if they make them for laptops but filters of some sort would be a good idea for the air intake slots in the laptop; it should help keep the inside nice and clean

 

Not a big fan of canned air, it will blow dirt, out of sight out of mind, into places that will do more harm than good in the long run. Just try to keep it covered up when not in use. I wish you the best. ed