How often do you power down?

[Cato]

I pay attention to my ram usage. At first boot it's usually at about 19% at idle. When it gets to 30%+, I usually power down. Pretty much just a quirk that I've carried over from Windows 95.

I use sleep exclusively when away from it for any length of time. I also turn off the monitors because of the horror stores I've read about monitor files. I'd rather do something that may not be necessary than to wish I had.

If you close your open programs, activate sleep mode, and then wake up the computer, it will flush the RAM the same way.

I thought that was the way it should work, but I've noticed that mine usually stays at about the same % even after waking up.

 

[JonM33]

Have you added up what a couple $$ a day costs per month? Per year? You could buy an entirely new machine with just the energy savings of turning it off when not using it.

It actually doesn't even cost that much but the $10 a month or so it does cost is still worth considering. All for... saving 30 seconds on a boot?

Thing is, everything adds up. And things that are left on 24/7 add up FAST, being comparable to big things that only run for an hour or two a day (or week).

I don't leave it on to spare 30 seconds of boot time. At idle the power draw is completely insignificant. CPUs use EIST to lower power draw, HDDs use insignificant power draw at idle (compared to start up), video cards drop down to fractions of original clock speeds to lower power draw, power supplies are more and more energy efficient, monitors go into stand-by mode, etc.

One could argue the wear and tear of turning a system off and on every day. There's the power surge at initial power on, hard drives really spike, fans usually go full bore. There's the thermal expansion, etc. Of course none of that is entirely proven. Hard drives either die during initial power on or if they have poor circulation and cook. I have never seen a PSU die during use but I have seen them make a long buzz and loud bang when powering on.

I don't know, due to such "green" energy saving technology put into the PC these days there isn't really any valid support to turn them off.

With Heavy usage, ALL DAY, and about 1000 watts of equip running (not max available, USED).. then maybe you will reach a couple dollars per day

Well, true. I'm going with worst case scenario. Not all states or countries charge the same for electricity.

 

[fseal]

Power in idle is still likely high unless you have some specifically low powered hardware, or have some very green hardware that is actually working well togeather. None of my machines have shown that level of idle power saving. At idle the power draw is probably still 100 watts or more (with 300 when playing a game normal).

I actually have a wall power meter at home which I use on the fish tanks (Talk about power hogs). I'll give it a whirl on my main machine tonight... It does have speed step on the i7 so I know that the power consumption is dropped from about 34 watts when playing games down to 8 at idle, but the rest of the system is pretty beefy and the GPU at idle sits at 60C so I know that's probably pulling some wattage, plus the memory MB, 15-20% PSU loss, etc, etc.

 

[gregrocker]

I set Sleep for 30 and Hibernate for 60. That way if I walk away and come back it can wake up quickly, but if I don't want to come back it turns off the machine for me with all of my work saved.

My roommate insists on keeping the power on at all times, including on his monitor which just burned out after a year. It irritates all of us who split the power bill.

 

[richc46]

It is always wise to turn off on ocassion. It is unwise to unplug a desktop. When plugged in a little bit of electricity flows through the circuits, keeping the settings etc. If you plug the plug, you are using the cmos battery, which will require replacement that much sooner; or worse die and your settings will be gone.

 

[MWRed]

I shut mine off every night(that is assuming that I have used it that day). I shut it off before I hit the bed, and it doesn't get turned back on until I get home from work the next day.
I only really use it at most, 4 or 5 hours in the evening.

 

[JonM33]

Power in idle is still likely high unless you have some specifically low powered hardware, or have some very green hardware that is actually working well togeather. None of my machines have shown that level of idle power saving. At idle the power draw is probably still 100 watts or more (with 300 when playing a game normal).

And 100 watts is equal to running a light bulb. It's really not that much.

I set Sleep for 30 and Hibernate for 60. That way if I walk away and come back it can wake up quickly, but if I don't want to come back it turns off the machine for me with all of my work saved.

My roommate insists on keeping the power on at all times, including on his monitor which just burned out after a year. It irritates all of us who split the power bill.

You sound like my former mother-in-law who, when I lived with her, insisted that I pay a higher percentage of the electric bill because I left my PC on 24/7. She was the one that would run the oven all day long, which burns up electricity like crazy. Then of course to counter the heat from the oven she would turn down the AC, which burned even more electricity.

A PC running 24/7 is chump change, honestly. Don't make a big deal about it.

 

[LFB]

I never shut down my machine...

Only for maintenance... like cleaning and hardware change... and I reboot 1 time at a week... and turn off the monitor wen I go to sleep...

Nowadays computers don't have the need for been power down...

 

[bassfisher6522]

Every night. Sleep mode during the day.

Same here for me.....never had a problem in doing so. In my case I use Asus software that combines hibernate/sleep-mode and a soft shutdown. I set it to turn everything off after 25 minutes of non use. It's a green thing for conserving power consumption.

 

[severedsolo]

It depends, My PC runs for days on end. If its busy overnight and I think it will finish while im asleep then I set it to autoshutdown when its done. If Ram becomes an issue, then a sleep and wake will give a memory flush (drops to 21%

 

[fseal]

Ok, some numbers!

This is the measured power consumption for my computer only (Well + mouse and KB). Does not include the monitors or delta IO breakout box, studio monitors or anything else.

Power off but plugged in: 4 Watts
Powered on, idle at desktop, nothing running: 235 watts
Doing things (Opening/closing programs, draging things around etc): 250-280 Watts
Running 3d Game: 355 Watts (Will vary by game)
Running Prime95: 365 Watts (Full CPU load, sililar to running folding at home or other 24/7 cpu loading program)
Running FurMark: 485-510 Watts (Full CPU and GPU load)
Sleep: 7 Watts

Leaving this machine on (not sleeping) 24/7 would cost me 235Watts * 24 * 30 = 169kWhr
Now on our tiered rate, if you turned just the computer off that means you would save on your top tier so that is about $0.28/kWhr = $47 a month! Running folding at home would cost me $74 a month.

SO there... Actually saving 100 or 200 watts a month on 24/7 in a tired system can save you mucho dinero. If on the other hand that computer was the only thing in the house using electricity the savings may be much less. at 10c it's "only" $16 a month. But stull, what a waste of power and money.

If your computer CAN survive repeated sleeps (Sadly so many desktops cannot), then that is by far better than leaving it on. But if you can't really... "Turn off the computer when you leave the room"

 

[JonM33]

Ok, some numbers!

This is the measured power consumption for my computer only (Well + mouse and KB). Does not include the monitors or delta IO breakout box, studio monitors or anything else.

Power off but plugged in: 4 Watts
Powered on, idle at desktop, nothing running: 235 watts
Doing things (Opening/closing programs, draging things around etc): 250-280 Watts
Running 3d Game: 355 Watts (Will vary by game)
Running Prime95: 365 Watts (Full CPU load, sililar to running folding at home or other 24/7 cpu loading program)
Running FurMark: 485-510 Watts (Full CPU and GPU load)
Sleep: 7 Watts

Leaving this machine on (not sleeping) 24/7 would cost me 235Watts * 24 * 30 = 169kWhr
Now on our tiered rate, if you turned just the computer off that means you would save on your top tier so that is about $0.28/kWhr = $47 a month! Running folding at home would cost me $74 a month.

SO there... Actually saving 100 or 200 watts a month on 24/7 in a tired system can save you mucho dinero. If on the other hand that computer was the only thing in the house using electricity the savings may be much less. at 10c it's "only" $16 a month. But stull, what a waste of power and money.

If your computer CAN survive repeated sleeps (Sadly so many desktops cannot), then that is by far better than leaving it on. But if you can't really... "Turn off the computer when you leave the room"

Wow, you pay $0.28/kWhr? That's crazy.

I pay $0.125/kWhr here in Columbus, Ohio. Say my rig uses 150W at idle (from various Radeon HD 5850 reviews on the web). Do the math and that is 108kWhr to run it 24/7. So it's $13.50 per month or $0.45 per day. That's chump change really.

 

[fseal]

My current top teir is 19c electricity + 9 c "distribution" so 28c/kWhr

The lowest tier is 6-7 cents or so, but you use that up with house lighting alone :/

This is why an all electric car in Ca make no sense at all. The cost to "fill" it nightly will be astronomical. It is with great irony that the new "Tesla" car company is setting up shop in the most expensive electrical market in the nation.

 

[bilzmale]

Thanks for all the posts - turned into an interesting thread. TVeblen and gregrocker - thanks for your suggestions. I am doing a rebuild soon (new mobo, psu, sound, extra hdd, more RAM and upgrade to 64 bit so will check how it runs then.

 

[Dzomlija]

I never turn Prometheus off, because:

1. She is constantly busy with downloads
2. She is the file server for my Mede8er media center in the lounge
3. I minimize wear and tear from constant on/off operations

I entered "Never" on the poll, because "Occasionally" doesn't fit the times when prometheus is turned off, which is usually only done with extreme weather (and lightning storms can get BAD here in South Africa), but this is rare, as I have a pretty powerfull UPS/Surge Protector keeping her company.

I last turned her off I think sometime in March, when I replaced her motherboard.

 

[dmillergv]

Windows Home Server, scheduled shutdown at 10 PM.
Power up WHS in the AM.
All other machines are shutdown when not in use.
If a machine is off for several days, WHS does a backup
as soon as possible when turned on.

 

[Topi]

I shutdown my main computer every night and open it again in morning. I would love to use the sleep mode but the blinking blue power light is so annoying specially when you are trying to sleep.

When I wake up first thing is to power up my PC then go to kitchen to make some coffee

 

[dood]

I have 7 machines running 24x7... (3 on a dual xeon ESX box)
So...my answer is NEVER.

The only drawback is that I end up replacing a couple or P/S's every year.

 

[CarlTR6]

I turn mine off only when I am gone for more than a day. I use the sleep mode overnight except for two nights when things are scheduled.

 

[Layback Bear]

I shut my computer down when not in use and also turn the power off at my surge protector. I replace my cmos battery about every 2 years or so. Now that's chump change.