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Member
I have been turning Off my game computer after I am done.
My question is is this a good pratice?
Who leaves there computer on all the time or is it a good pratice to shut it down when not in use.
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Banned
Mine stays on at 100% load 24/7 as I do distributed computing for Stanford University's Folding at Home medical research program.
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Senior Member
My wife is also very pleased that I fold my own at home.
BTW, I turn mine off when not in use.
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Senior Member
Strange question, I would`ve thought it logical (plus saving on wear and tear and cash) to switch off your PC after use. the only times i`ve ever seen Pcs continuously on 24/7 have been with business companies and security.
A slight problem I`ve had recently... I switched my daughter`s PC to a different wall socket in her room because of position change for her access to the net. Now every time she switches off her PC at the wall switch (after switching her Pc off normally) all the electric goes out apart from the lights in the whole place.
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Banned
Vista has a nice "power down" feature...
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Member
Well, I understand your question. In the good old days it was considered that the wear on the components in a computer at startup contributed to about 50 hours of normal "running" wear. Spinning up drives, initial power spikes etc. Modern PSU:s and MB:s are a lot better at starting "nicely" so I guess that it's a lot better. The drives still get a hammering when reving up to 7.200, 10.000 or 15.000 rpm. I guess that the wear from that is handled better today but we all know when HD:s start screaming... In 95% of the cases I've encountered it's when you boot.
I used to run my computer at home 7x24 earlier but nowadays they make to much noice so my wife is not that happy about it. Doesn't feel right to shut them down though! Computers are made for running!
/Mazex
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Senior Member
Just imagine that critical power supply fan going out whilst you are asleep. PSU's have also been known to catch fire from time to time, as well as monitors. Is it worth taking the chance?
I am a Firefighter, and let's just say I've seen it more than once.
My computer goes off at night, or when I'm not home.
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Senior Member
All of my home systems are up basically 24/7. I usually reboot them once a week whether they need it or not.
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Senior Member
Well to me i turn off my PC every night since windows is not good enough to keep all clean 24/7.
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Senior Member
I've had a lot of variation in the failure rate of my hard drives. Some last 6 months and some last 5 years.
This wide variation suggests to me that booting your machine repeatedly has little or no effect on the life of the drive. The life of the drive has more to do with the type, and inherent defects (otherwise they would all last the same time).
Even if booting did affect lifespan slightly, the savings in electricity would far exceed whatever additional cost for hard disks.
A hard disk costs maybe $100 and might lasts me an average of 3 years, regardless of how often I boot the machine (I boot mine many times a day).
So that's an average cost of 10 cents per day for the hard disk. A low estimate for the electrical consumption of a computer used for 4 hours a day and left on the remaining 20 hours is about 30-40 cents per day, for a slow desktop computer with an LCD. If I turn off the computer for those additional 20 hours, I could save maybe half that amount (because an idling PC uses less power than an active one). The cost of the 20 hours of daily idle time could be $80 a year or more.
So disks are cheap and power is expensive. You should turn it off for the same reason you turn off a light bulb when you leave the room, or turn off your car instead of idling.
Here's some further information: http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/computers.html