OS X was easy enough to grasp - within my first day I could perform all the usual tasks I did on my PC, as well as navigate the system preferences and play around a little bit in terminal.  The difference between my Windows and OS X experience, however, was that I didn't know how to fix a problem in OS X.

OS X requires much less maintenance than Windows.  You don't need to reinstall every few months to keep it running nice, and there's no registry to clean or get corrupted.  Still, there are things in any OS that need to be attended to, and OS X is no exception.  Here are a few quick things you can do in OS X to keep your Mac running at its full potential.

UPDATE SOFTWARE

This one may seem obvious, but many people don't update their software automatically and forget to check every once in a while for updated OS patches or versions of their software.  Being up to date will ensure that you are secure and can even boost your overall performance and increase battery life in the case of portables.

To update the system software on your Mac, click the little Apple in the upper left corner and select "Update Software..."  You will be guided through the process of getting the latest system software.  Also visit Apple Support for any firmware updates.  These change the way your core system components work for the better.

Don't just keep system software up to date - also check for newer version of software you use a lot.  The latest Firefox versions notify you when there is a newer version, but if you have an old version you might need to visit Firefox's page to upgrade. Check with the developers of other software you use to make sure you're not using an outdated version.

REPAIR DISK PERMISSIONS

Every once in a while your Mac may exhibit odd behavior.  Programs locking up or crashing and any other unexpected behavior can be a sign that you need to repair your disk permissions.  On the other hand, if programs are loading themselves, emails are writing themselves, and you hear voices coming from your speakers, you may need to call an exorcist.

Repairing disk permission is easy.  Just open up the disk utility (Applications/Utilities) and click on your Mac's drive in the left pane.  Click on the "first aid" tab, then select "Repair Disk Permissions."  You do not need to verify permissions first.

DEFRAGMENT YOUR HARD DRIVE

Defragmenting your drive in Windows is a must to keep your performance up.  In OS X, having your drive fragmented isn't going to costs you much in the way of performance, but if its really bad it can cause some unusual behavior.  A lot of defragmentation takes place automagically by OS X.

To find out if you need a little extra help in the defragmenting department, check out this free tool ShowVolumeFrag by Andreas Michalak.  If you determine you need to defragment, search around for a tool to do so.  I have yet to find a good free solution, and I'm not going to link to any commercial options here.

OPTIMIZE SPOTLIGHT

I've all but left spotlight - it was one of my favorite features in OS X, but Quicksilver just does a lot better job of things.  If you still use spotlight, however, you may benefit from rebuilding its database.  The quickest way to do this open up your System Preferences and select the spotlight menu item.  Click on the privacy tab and add your entire hard drive to the items not to be indexed.  Try a search to verify that nothing comes up.  Then simply remove your drive from the privacy list and the index will be rebuilt.

It is a good idea to leave your computer on for several hours while the index updates, although I don't think it's absolutely necessary.

MANAGING PREFERENCES

From what I understand, getting your preferences file corrupted was a common thing before 10.4.  Still, I have experienced the dreaded preferences corruption in OS 10.4 and found a handy tool called preferential treatment that will check for corrupted preferences and give you the option of deleting them.  The affected program will then rebuild it's preferences file next time it starts up.

I would recommend trying out the tool mentioned above for a few weeks.  If you notice it picking up a lot of problems, continue running it weekly, otherwise run it every month or two.

REPAIR DISK

For really weird problems that just won't go away, try repairing the disk.  To do this, open the disk utility again (Applications/Utilities) and select your drive.  In the first aid tab, select repair disk.  Watch to make sure there are no errors.  If errors are found, run disk repair again until it reports your drive is free of errors.

CLEAR YOUR CACHES

It's a good idea to clear your caches out if your system seems a bit sluggish or otherwise buggy.  Cache Out X is a script that will take care of deep cleaning your various system and browser caches.  This is a really good idea and should be run every few weeks.

REBOOT

We don't like to admit it, but every once in a while OS X can use a good reboot.  Shut down your computer through the Apple menu and turn it back on.  You might be surprised what problems go away.  It is worthy to note that rebooting is a maintenance item in OS X while it's a daily necessity in Windows. ;)