Shut Down Nightly vs 24/7 Studies?

gregrocker · 06 Feb 2012

I agree with letting the Power Options do the work.

I like to be able to walk away without concern about saving my work whether I come back in an hour or a week. If I set sleep to 30 minutes it is at the ready to jerk back awake if I quickly return, then after an hour I let it hibernate which is the same as shutting down - except that it writes what was left out on the desktop to the HD and starts back up much quicker.

All good reasons for using the modern Power Saving features perfected in Win7.

If I don't have a mandated restart for Updates every few days then I restart anyway.

Sbrideau · 06 Feb 2012

I like to use the sleep function, and do a complete shut down at least once a month to clear the memory, and other junk that can get in there.

I do not know of any actual studies for this though.

Infinite · 06 Feb 2012

I shut down every 12 hours at least.

wanchoo · 06 Feb 2012

There may not be any definitive studies on whether to shut sown or leave the computer on but my gut feeling as a retired mechanical engineer is to shut down the computer when not in use for one hour and over like almost any other machine.

Apart from fans gathering dust and wastage of energy another reason would be to reduce the chances of the computer getting fried due to spikes especially during a storm. True the spikes can occur at any time but at least they wouldn't damage the computer when it is shut down.

dreamer · 07 Feb 2012

richnrockville said:

Jack1953, My recommendation is to shut down if your not going to be using it for a while. Especially any laptops.
Leaving the computer on allows the fans to keep sucking in dust which over time could impede the heat sink on your processor. This is not good.

Just my opinion.

Rich

This advice is the best IMO.I found it the hard way when recently dust accumulated near heat sink and it completely blocked out the fans.Had to bring to technician to open case and clean everything out.

Britton30 · 07 Feb 2012

I have a 7 year-old Compaq which was born with XP and evolved to Win 7 which is always on except for once every few weeks shut down to dust it out. I do however shut off my LCD monitor daily.

JMH · 10 Feb 2012

Energy consumption here is of no concern as we produce our own Solar Power...{ & sell surplus to the grid}
Computers not being used "enjoy" sleep mode.
Rebooting is carried out if / when necessary.

flirno · 10 Feb 2012

bigmck said:

I am shocked............I would have bet the house that 95% of you guys leave it on all the time. Well that just "shows to go ya" that when someone knows everything (as I do), that they can even be wrong.

Startup/Shutdown is very fast for me but to begin with I never left my computer on if I was going to be away from it for more than a few hours. I tend to have gaming rigs with a lot of components and they do suck up a lot of power.

Also I would never leave a computer with SSDs on 24/7.

Layback Bear · 10 Feb 2012

Other than a few seconds of boot time what is the advantage of leaving a computer non server on 24/7? I'm slow in the brain so type slow so I can understand it.

M1GU31 · 10 Feb 2012

I turn my off every time i stop using it and have hibernate disabled, I believe that a computer will last longer if you let it rest because they will not wear out from extensive long use for example the fans spinning 24/7 will ware them out and the psu and the rest of the system always sucking out power will 1 get you a bigger electric bill and possibly shorten the life of the psu.Although this is what i believe and i'm not saying it will. This is the way i see it so i turn mine off daily when not using it and rarely leave it on by itself on idle unless im making a big file or downloading somthing. Other then that i turn it off.