Make a Schedule for Maintenance Tasks

Have you ever wished that your computer does some things automatically without bothering you? In Windows 8, there exists a tool that will help you schedule when and how often a program or task runs so you won’t be bothered of running it every now and then when you feel it is needed.

When you set a certain maintenance task, Windows 8 will ask if you want it to happen once or you’d like it to be a recurring one. Since most of these tasks are demanding on your machine’s memory and can even affect the processing speed, it would be helpful if you schedule it on times that you are not using your computer. It is also possible to schedule programs and other apps to run on Windows 8’s startup. For instance, you can set Microsoft Outlook to open and as well as download all your emails as soon as your machine opens and connects to a network.

Maintaining Your PC’s Health

There are certain tasks in your Windows machine that should be run to keep it functioning on top performance. However, these tasks are not easy to remember to run especially if you are a busy person but thankfully in Windows 8, you can schedule all these tasks to work and run automatically without you intervening to start the process. Below are the steps which you need to follow so you can start taking advantage of this feature on your Windows 8 machine.

1. Make a Dry-Run of the Task

Since Windows 8 is going to run the task that you want to set schedule for automatically, it would be a great idea if you run it first just to make sure that it will not cause errors and other side-effects after it finishes its job. If you are satisfied with the result and you didn’t find any negative effects on any processes in your machine, it is time to begin scheduling it so it can work on the exact time that you set it to do its task automatically. In this example, we will be using Windows 8’s Disk Cleanup utility.

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2. Open Task Scheduler

The next step would be opening the Task Scheduler tool. To do this, simply  open the “Start Screen” then start typing “schedule tasks” on your machine’s keyboard. After doing so, the search feature will appear containing a search results category just below the input box. From these categories, simply click on “Settings” and on the left-hand side of the screen, you should see a shortcut that says “Schedule tasks”. Just click this shortcut to open “Task Scheduler”.

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3. Create the Task that You Want

Next, on the “Task Scheduler” Window, simply click on the link that says “Create Basic Task” found under the “Actions” pane at the right hand side of the screen. After doing so, the “Create Basic Task Wizard” will appear where you need to input a name that is easy to remember and as well as a description if you like. A description will help you track the task that you created. Once you input the needed details, simply click on the “Next” button.

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4. Select When and How Often the Task Runs

The next Window will then ask you how often you want to run the task. The options are “Daily”, “Weekly”, “Monthly”, “One time”, “When the computer starts”, “When I log on” and “When a specific event is logged”. The last option would trigger the task when a specific event like creating a file starts. In this step, you need to select an option correctly and think of a schedule when you are not using your computer especially if you are planning to run a task that is heavy on the processor to avoid negative effects like slowing down, hangs and freezes. After choosing the option that you like, simply click “Next”.

5. Be More Specific with the Schedule

After clicking “Next”, you will arrive at a Window where you will be asked for more details about the schedule depending on the option that you have selected in Step 4. You can tweak aspects like the time, day and as well as the frequency of the task or what event would trigger the task to start. If you selected to run the task when you log on to your computer or when it turns on, the wizard will skip this step and will just take you directly to another screen where you can do more tweaks depending on the option you selected.

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6. Select the Action that You Want

In the Window that follows, you’ll need to select whether you want to start a program, send an email or display a message on your computer screen. The first option is what we will be selecting since we are learning how to schedule a maintenance task. After selecting the task that you want to use, simply click on the “Next” button. You can choose the program that you want to run simply by clicking on “Browse”. Once  you find its location, simply click on its “.exe” file so you can finally have the program set on the schedule you selected.

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7. Review the Details then Hit Finish

After hitting the “Next” button, the wizard will then ask you to review all the details before finally clicking the “Finish” button. Be sure that all of the settings and preferences are right so that nothing wrong will happen to the process when it finally starts. If everything is right, simply hit “Finish” but if there is something that needs to be changed, simply hit the “Back” button.

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8. View Tasks and Modify them Anytime

That’s it! You have now created your very first automatic task using the “Task Scheduler” tool on your Windows 8 machine. If you decide to update or change any part of a task you have created, you can easily do so by simply opening “Task Scheduler”, click on “Task Scheduler Library” and you will see a list of all the tasks that runs on your computer depending on its settings. Clicking on any task from the list will take you to its settings Window where you can tweak some details like its name, description, when it runs and how often the task would run automatically.

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