IT Jeopardy. "Yup, I already have. Twice."

What's the question? Should be an easy one, right?

"Have you restarted?"

If that's what you said, you're on the money. But why does it work? And not just for computers, but phones, modems, routers, and literally anything that's powered by electricity and has some smarts to it?

The answer here varies, but realistically it comes down to things that are run by computers. I'm not talking just standard desktop and laptop computers, but also tiny computers that might control your dishwasher, your coffee machine, or even your home modem that also runs your Wi-Fi.

As efficient as computers are, they're by no means perfect. They can develop glitches and start to not run well and do weird things like making your fonts massive and display less colourful images because the video drivers it's been using for over 6 years, are no longer wanting to drive.

And that's mainly why computers could do with a "reboot" every now and then OR when things aren't working as they should. You've closed Word, can no longer see Word, but you start Task Manager, and BOOM Word's still there, laughing almost. This also goes for everyone's favourite web browser Google Chrome. A notorious (notorious) memory hog, if you have any more than 2 Chrome tabs going it'll take as much RAM as it can get and leave the rest of your programs wanting, and your computer running like poop (running like a dog just simply isn't accurate. Dogs run extremely well).

On top of fixing glitches like these, there are also times when computers are waiting to install updates and patches and firmwares and the only way to do this is if you restart.

And it's not just the computers themselves. Its sensors, other bits of hardware and internal components that could all do with a restart even now and then.

A classic example of this is the USB ports on your computer. This isn't too common, but it does happen, and it's simply when a USB device (a mouse, a keyboard, a thumb drive, etc) will just not work in any of the USB ports you plug it into. Rebooting in many cases will help, but if it doesn't, turning the computer off, unplugging the power cable, and holding the computer's power button down for 30 secs, then plugging it back in and bringing it back to life usually sorts this USB problem out. This is called discharging the capacitors.

And it all begins, with a restart.

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