Mac OS X Troubleshooting & Maintenance

Mac Troubleshooting and Maintenance - OS X

Description:

Are you torn between upgrading your Mac or buying a new one? Is your company moving to OS X? Just what is OS X 10.2 & 10.3 and how does it work? Get your hands dirty "under the hood" of OS X and find the tools and ansewrs you're looking for on troubleshooting memory, hard drives that are running and have crashed, power supplies, PRAM, printing, peripherals, and more. Discussions include an in-depth look inside the Mac OS X System, hardware, what files and folders can be troubleshot, special boot modes, upgrading processors and video cards, dealing with incompatible hardware, legacy devices and more. Hands-on activities include take apart and reassembly, memory and hard drive upgrades, and a troubleshooting "run-through." You'll come away from the workshop with the knowledge of how to repair or upgrade your Mac, make smart decisions for future purchases and upgrades, and preventive maintenance steps you can take to keep your Macs running smoothly, a confidence in knowing more about OS X 10.2 & 10.3, and how to prevent data loss, restore a user's data and preferences, and more. This course is taught on OS X 10.3 workstations but the troubleshooting techniques you'll learn are equally applicable to OS X 10.2.

Who should attend: Home Users, Macintosh Administrators and Support Technicians, Consultants, Graphic Artists and Production Managers, Repair Technicians, Educational Computer Lab Administrators, or anyone responsible for keeping Macintosh Computers up and running

Days: two (weekdays) or four (nights or weekends)
Hands-on: yes
Hours 9-4
Cost: $499
Materials Included: Guidebook and two CDs with freeware/shareware enhancements for your Mac, along with how-to videos illustrating take-apart and upgrades

Prerequisites and Experience: Basic knowledge of Mac OS 9 or higher, familiarity with computer hardware basics.

Day One

Hardware & Software Components of the Mac:

* What makes a Macintosh "different" from other computers?
* Identify major components of Mac hardware
* Discuss various Mac input-output ports
* Expansion buses and cards
* SCSI, IDE, Firewire and USB: which are the right choices?
* Troubleshooting floppy and Zip Drives
* A complete overview of the Mac OS X 10.2 installation process
* The Mac OS X 10.2 boot process and special boot modes
* Creating and Managing User Accounts

Preparing Yourself for Troubleshooting:

* Putting together a Mac toolkit
* Troubleshooting SCSI, IDE and Serial ATA
* Parameter Ram (PRAM)
* The MacOS boot sequence
* The importance of ROM and firmware
* What to do when your Mac won't boot
* An in-depth look at important OS X System components
* Which Macs will only boot in OS X.
* How OS X extensions differ from OS 9 extensions
* How to upgrade and install applications without hassles
* Using Apple's built-in disk utilities, and third-party disk utilities
* How to tell the difference between hardware and software problems
* Decode the most common system error messages

Day Two

Troubleshooting Logic Board Devices:

* SDRAM, SODIMMS, and DDR RAM
* How to identify problem RAM
* Troubleshooting ports and network connections
* Knowing when to replace power supplies
* How to perform a complete reset of your Mac

Monitors, Speakers, Printers, Mice and Keyboards:

* When is it time to repair or replace a monitor?
* What monitors are available today?
* Refresh rates, digital v. analog, resolutions and video adapters
* Attaching speakers to your Mac
* Resurrecting damaged keyboards and mice
* Printer connections, print quality, and font installation and management

Troubleshooting Hard Disks and Other Media:

* How to select the best hard drive to upgrade your system
* Hard drive troubleshooting and backup
* Recovering data from a failed drive
* Strategies to protect your data: backing up and archiving
* Installing CDs, DVDs, and CD Burners
* Removable Media options and tape backup devices

Basic Networking:

* The Mac file sharing model: how to make it work for you
* Sharing files between Mac OS X workstations
* Understanding permissions and file ownership
* Connecting your Mac:
* Ethernet, Airport and Dial-up
* Overview of Mac server options
* High speed internet access: cable modems, dial-up, DSL, T1 lines
* OS XTerminal commands for troubleshooting your network connection

Upgrades and Extending the Usefulness of Your Macintosh:

* Identify which Mac models can be "brought up to speed"
* How to determine if upgrades are cost-effective
* Evaluate Mac OS upgrades and processor upgrades