[jaredigital]

this seems to be an eternally intriguing topic among computer users. i'd like to know: how often do you turn off your computer? as in, the power supply is OFF. do you turn it off at night after you've finished using it, or do you leave it on all the time? and PLEASE include the REASON you do what you do. i've heard some mighty interesting pros and cons on both sides. i'd like to get a better idea of which is better to do, and why.

feel free to be excessively lengthy in your response. :)

[Vetritus03]

i have a laptop... i turn it off or hibernate it when not in use... of course... as for desktops... i work tech support so i know about this one.  TURN IT OFF... would you leave your car running in the drive way?  also... hard drives are rated to last for so many hours... and... power on is clicking the time away... so turn the sucker off.

[Null and Void]

Every night and time I leave the house I turn it off. My main worry is about it overheating randomly (when the house gets really hot, our AC is pretty weird) but I'd also like to get the most life out of my hardware.

[Quik]

I totally agree.
Keep the darn thing off, when you arnt using it! It's very simple and unless your running a ftp etc. i dont quite understand why people keep it on. Not only is it burning you system but its wasting your hydro! of course if your a kid it wont matter but think bout how much energy it uses!

[jaredigital]

interesting responses so far... not what i expected at all! BTW, Vetritus03... what about power saver setups? i can turn my hard disks off and run at a low power setting. you still think the system should be turned off completely?

[Quik]

This is exactly what blows my mind:
"what about power saver setups? i can turn my hard disks off and run at a low power setting."
Ok now your basically saying to run your computer like its a poor kid without legs and arms.. lol honestly if your going to turn OFF your hd turn OFF your monitor and LOWER the power settings why the #### wouldnt u just turn the whole #### thing OFF! LOL

[Vetritus03]

power management was designed solely for laptops... low power using devices that can be easily powered down adn woken back up... ACPI helped a bit... but you wouldn't believe how many calls i get on systems that won't wake up from sleep/standby... hibernate support was good in Win2k... adn better in Xp... you need a motherboard that can support it first... but that usually works the best. problem with desktops is you have these 5400/7200 RPM drives and suce that just can't fire up as fast as they should and before they do Windows or the processor or whatever makes a call to them and they aren't answering yet... and POW lockup.  personally i disable all power management support when i get these calls. save the minimum settings that allow the automatic shut off on shutdown.  on older systems i can see the hassle of waiting for it to boot and windows to be ready to go... and yes you could power save your system and let it boot quicker... new machines don't have this issue... most i see boot in under 30 seconds... maybe a minute tops.  look at this also... your RAM doesn't get truly cleaned out until the power is off... so, restarting is a good thing.

[Quik]

very true Vetritus03 ... Good point about the ram. I mean i know poeple who keep there pc's on untill a power outage etc... and that cant be good for ram.

By the way Vetritus03 how did u get the hook up on the XP? i mean im installing a final release in bout 30min, just curious how u got it

[Vetritus03]

e-mail me on that one...

[jaredigital]

good, good stuff! you guys rock!

okay, here's one of the CONS i've heard about turning off your computer too often. see what you think.

1)the warmup and cooldown of the machine, especially the sensitive chipset/motherboard, will eventually cause microfractures to appear and damage the computer. A soft reboot daily and proper use of energy saver options will preserve a computer's longevity.

i heard this at FK, and it sounded slightly plausible, but i wasn't fully convinced.

i usually turn off my computer nightly, but i've been experimenting with leaving it on and setting it to "sleep" after 20 minutes idle time. it actually seems to be acting up more by doing this. not serious stuff, but DEFINITELY stupid "you're aout of memory" messages have been pooping up, which NEVER happened before. so i have to agree with you all. i think i will resume turning it off at night.

[Quik]

the warmup and cooldown of the machine, especially the sensitive chipset/motherboard, will eventually cause microfractures to appear and damage the computer.
Ok, and keeping it on wont? heh, i doubt turning it off will do MORE damage then having it on all the time.

[Vetritus03]

about the time you get these fractures you'll be trading in your P4 for a P7...
Gateway warrants the hardware in the machine for 3 years on most models... they wouldn't do that if they thought that the PCs would fail before then... at least i don't think...   but good plan to turn it off.

[SilverSurfer]

Now I tell my clients to turn it off, however, my system running win2k i leave running...infact it's been running for about a week now...why you ask? well, being on a network i have it on so my roomate can access it thats pretty much it...I also allow users of morpheus to dl my stuff.  Thats it. no other reason...
in the event of a power outage i have it keep itself off which has really come in handy.  But thats it.. i restart it when I go to bed is all I do...

other than that theres no real reason why normal folks shouldn't shut it off..

[Ruck]

I leave my 'puter on all the time because you know.. never know when I might need to use it.. and I'm almost running two 24/7 IRC bots on it. :razz: Plus, it's a Mac.. it can take it. :smile: I've had a record uptime of 2 weeks 12 hours with this babeh.. and that's with just 192 MB of Mem and a 350Mhz G3 Proc. Yay. :yes:

[objekt404]

always on!  i never *need* to turn it off w/Be (mainly i leave it on 'cause wintermute is the file server/SETi processor).  i've had it logged up to 35 days, only shut it down to get into win98.  even if it is costing me ฤ in power, its worth it to be able & sit down first thing in the morning w/o waiting for boot up (which takes about 1-1 1/2 minutes for win98, 10 sec for Be r4.5).

lettem run, they'll keep your house warmer! (& you'll know when the power drops from the UPS).