Thinking of using your trusty household vacuum cleaner to suck the dust out of your computer? Think again!
I’d strongly advise against it. Regular vacuums can generate static electricity that spells doom for your computer’s delicate electrical components. And even with all their might, they often leave pesky fine dust clinging to the motherboard.
But fear not, there are smarter ways to tackle computer dust, and we’re about to spill the beans in this post. So, while you shouldn’t vacuum the inside of your computer, go ahead and vacuum around it – just keep those sensitive electronics safe and sound!
How To Clean Your Computer Video
Here is a great video showing you how to clean your computer. Be sure to look below for even more advice and items that make cleaning your computer easy and safe!
What To Use Instead
What you want to use instead of a household vacuum cleaner is a blower. You can get cans of dusters like these here (Amazon Link Ad) just about anywhere. They work fine for the guy looking to dust every so often.
The problem with using Canned Dusters is that they don’t last long and lose power quickly. Plus, the Canned Dusters are not as powerful as the Electric Computer Dusters.
You can get electric computer dusters like this one here (Amazon Link Ad) that work far better than the canned ones. This is the better option because you won’t have to keep buying canned dusters every time you need to dust.
Make sure to dust the computer outside to avoid putting the dust back inside the home.
An Even Better Option
You should not use a household vacuum cleaner when cleaning a PC, but there is a vacuum cleaner made for cleaning computers that you can use.
The Metro Vacuum MDV-1BA DataVac Pro 4.5-AMP Computer Vac/Blower (Amazon Link Ad) is probably the best thing to use to clean a computer or any electrical component of dust. This vacuum sucks the dust in, but it also is a very strong blower that works well to get that fine dust off the electronics of the computer.
Why Can’t I Use My House Vacuum Cleaner?
Modern vacuum cleaners you use for your floors don’t have PC cleaning in mind when they build them. They don’t care about the static electricity that the dust and the plastic create as there is nothing on your floors that can be harmed by it.
The static charge it builds is small, but it only takes a small charge to destroy the sensitive CMOS or TTL components of a computer. With computers costing $1,000’s of dollars do you really want to risk killing it because you used a big household vacuum cleaner?