Fall is one of the busiest times of year for technology. Kids are back in school and need their laptops for homework. Remote workers are ramping back up after summer. And before you know it, the holidays arrive and everyone wants to video call family, shop online, and set up new devices.

The last thing you want is a slow, glitchy, or failing computer when you need it most. The good news: a few simple checks right now can save you a lot of frustration later.

Here are five things worth looking at before the fall season gets into full swing.

Updates are easy to ignore — they always seem to pop up at the worst time. But skipping them for months means your computer is missing important security patches and performance improvements.

On Windows: Go to Settings → Windows Update and click Check for updates. Let it run, then restart when prompted.

On a Mac: Click the Apple menu → System Settings → General → Software Update.

If updates have been piling up for a long time, this process may take a while. That is normal. Let it finish, and your computer will be in much better shape.

A hard drive that is nearly full is one of the most common reasons computers slow down. Windows and macOS both need free space to operate smoothly — as a general rule, try to keep at least 10–15% of your drive free.

On Windows: Open File Explorer → This PC and look at the bar under your main drive. If it is mostly red or orange, it is time to clean up.

On a Mac: Click the Apple menu → About This Mac → More Info → Storage.

Start by emptying your Recycle Bin or Trash, deleting old downloads, and moving photos and videos to an external drive or cloud storage like Google Photos or iCloud.

Slow internet is one of the most common complaints we hear from families across Baltimore, Howard, Harford, and Carroll Counties — especially when multiple people are home at once.

Go to fast.com or speedtest.net and run a quick test. If your speeds are significantly lower than what your internet plan promises, try restarting your router first. Unplug it, wait 30 seconds, and plug it back in.

If speeds are still slow after a restart, the issue may be your router's placement, interference from other devices, or a problem with your internet service.

Fall is a great time to make sure your photos, documents, and other important files are backed up somewhere safe. Hard drives can fail without warning, and no one wants to lose years of family photos.

The simplest options:

• Cloud backup: Google Drive, iCloud, or OneDrive automatically back up your files in the background.
• External hard drive: Plug in a drive and copy your most important folders. A basic 1TB external drive costs around $50 and can hold tens of thousands of photos.

If you are not sure whether your files are backed up, that is worth finding out before something goes wrong.

Make sure your antivirus software is active and up to date. On Windows 10 and 11, Windows Defender is built in and free — just make sure it is turned on and has run a recent scan.

Go to Windows Security (search for it in the Start menu) and look for any warnings or alerts. If everything shows green checkmarks, you are in good shape.

If you have a third-party antivirus program, open it and check when it last updated its definitions and ran a full scan.

If you run through this list and something does not look right — updates that will not install, a drive that is almost full with no obvious files to delete, or antivirus warnings you do not understand — that is a good time to call a professional.

At My Neighbor Tech, we offer in-home and remote tech support for families and seniors across the Baltimore area. We can run a full computer health check, clean things up, and make sure you are ready for whatever the fall season brings.

Call or text us at (443) 992-6271, or schedule a visit online. We are your neighbor — and we are here to help.