[SOLVED] Few ordinary PC questions.

[Kremen]

I have bought very expensive PC.
i7 Gen 10, 2x 500GB Samsung evo 970, asus tuf z490 etc.
I have few like new begginer questions just to confirm my thoughts, because I am not sure if I am thinking right.

1. Is it better for computers to stay always on without going to sleep or hibernate, or it's better to shut the down, when we watch it on long lasting side of computers, which way it will last longer.
2. I was creating music and playing games on all my previous computers and neither got past 2 or 3 years, so something what I do is probably making their life shorter, is it music making where I use kontakt samples, fl studio etc. which goes into ram, needs to use SSD always, needs to use RAM always, needs to use CPU always, or it is actually gaming, for example Call of Duty Modern Warfare that is worse than any music making and hits computers on hard work making their life shorter?
3. My computers are always in room without anyone smoking or bringing any dust, but 2-3 years later its full of dust, fans are full of something very dark like coal got stuck on them, why is this happening?

 

[rgd1101]

toss up.

not enough detail to know

people bring a lot of dust. leave it in a clean room or closet

 

[PC Tailor]

1. Doesn't overly matter. Being left on isn't the thing that affects lifespan, it's more what you do with it. Temperature, poor quality components, or poor application of overclocking for example are far more damaging than just leaving it on.

Leaving it on means fans are always (or nearly always) running, which means the lifespan of your fans will likely decrease, which could then lead to poorer cooling if not fixed, then the poor cooling is what causes more damage.

Just putting it to sleep is always a good shout. I'm always an advocate of shutting down regularly.

2. In reality, most good software in most applications requires a bit of everything. Depends on the music editting but SSD won't make your editting any quicker, it will just make data storage, retrieval, and ongoing file usage quicker.

You'll want a good CPU to actually do the hard processing work for you. It will be CPU intensive.

You just need enough RAM to deal with the file sizes and software requirements. More RAM won't mean faster unless your usage is using more RAM than you have available.

3. Dust isn't what you probably think it is, it accrues over time from literally everything. You being in the room will bring dust. Air will bring in dust. Dust will form in the room over time from a combination of things.

Standard and good practice for any computer is to clean it out regularly. Some people do this monthly, quarterly, yearly, and some don't at all. Leaving a PC for 2 years is guaranteed to have lots of dust.

Your fans don't discriminate between air and dust, it just draws in or extracts whatever it can, it pulls in air, which pulls in dust with it, which then sticks to your components. The less you clean it, the more it sticks.

 

[Kremen]

toss up.

not enough detail to know

people bring a lot of dust. leave it in a clean room or closet

So we can't really say that PC will last longer without playing games or making music, and also leaving it on or off?

 

[Kremen]

1. Doesn't overly matter. Being left on isn't the thing that affects lifespan, it's more what you do with it. Temperature, poor quality components, or poor application of overclocking for example are far more damaging than just leaving it on.

Leaving it on means fans are always (or nearly always) running, which means the lifespan of your fans will likely decrease, which could then lead to poorer cooling if not fixed, then the poor cooling is what causes more damage.

Just putting it to sleep is always a good shout. I'm always an advocate of shutting down regularly.

2. In reality, most good software in most applications requires a bit of everything. Depends on the music editting but SSD won't make your editting any quicker, it will just make data storage, retrieval, and ongoing file usage quicker.

You'll want a good CPU to actually do the hard processing work for you. It will be CPU intensive.

You just need enough RAM to deal with the file sizes and software requirements. More RAM won't mean faster unless your usage is using more RAM than you have available.

3. Dust isn't what you probably think it is, it accrues over time from literally everything. You being in the room will bring dust. Air will bring in dust. Dust will form in the room over time from a combination of things.

Standard and good practice for any computer is to clean it out regularly. Some people do this monthly, quarterly, yearly, and some don't at all. Leaving a PC for 2 years is guaranteed to have lots of dust.

Your fans don't discriminate between air and dust, it just draws in or extracts whatever it can, it pulls in air, which pulls in dust with it, which then sticks to your components. The less you clean it, the more it sticks.

I see.
From now on I will shut it down when I am not using it I guess.
Some of people told me that my music workflow with heavy things on RAM, SSD and CPU can cause shorter life of hardware, and they told me gaming is even worse.
For the dust, it's really weird where from it gathers such dark like coal dust.

 

[logainofhades]

The only thing that is hard on those components is heat, with the exception of the SSD. They do have a limited terabytes written, also.

 

[PC Tailor]

Some of people told me that my music workflow with heavy things on RAM, SSD and CPU can cause shorter life of hardware, and they told me gaming is even worse.

Honestly, whilst this isn't entirely untrue, it's kind of like saying "don't kick a football because that will reduce the lifespan of the football". It's a football, it's made to be kicked.

Your PC components are made to be used for this, they can handle a hell of a lot and have a lot of safeguards in place to help deal with issues that you may have overlooked.

The bigger issue is how people treat them WITH their usage. Keep your components cool, clean, and don't go messing with voltages or clock speeds of things if you don't know what you're doing with it - those things will cause far more problems.

 

[Colif]

Some of people told me that my music workflow with heavy things on RAM, SSD and CPU can cause shorter life of hardware, and they told me gaming is even worse.

So i guess to make sure PC lasts forever we should just not use them? as all use can wear them out. I should have done that a year ago when i got this one.

I wouldn't worry about wear and just pick good parts that won't die prematurely

 

[TerryLaze]

1. I was creating music and playing games on all my previous computers and neither got past 2 or 3 years, so something what I do is probably making their life shorter,

Maybe figure out what broke in your old systems and go from there.


In general the boot up process puts a lot of stress on the hardware because a lot of voltage is required to wake everything up but in the long run it's not goin to make any real difference if you shut the system off.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

I have bought very expensive PC.
i7 Gen 10, 2x 500GB Samsung evo 970, asus tuf z490 etc.
I have few like new begginer questions just to confirm my thoughts, because I am not sure if I am thinking right.

1. Is it better for computers to stay always on without going to sleep or hibernate, or it's better to shut the down, when we watch it on long lasting side of computers, which way it will last longer.
2. I was creating music and playing games on all my previous computers and neither got past 2 or 3 years, so something what I do is probably making their life shorter, is it music making where I use kontakt samples, fl studio etc. which goes into ram, needs to use SSD always, needs to use RAM always, needs to use CPU always, or it is actually gaming, for example Call of Duty Modern Warfare that is worse than any music making and hits computers on hard work making their life shorter?
3. My computers are always in room without anyone smoking or bringing any dust, but 2-3 years later its full of dust, fans are full of something very dark like coal got stuck on them, why is this happening?

Just use it and don't obsess over things that don't matter at all in the bigger picture.

However, statistically speaking, the largest number of failures, by far, come when turning your computer on as everything is coming from a cold, dead state to full operation in a fraction of a second. That surge is what causes component failure. Again, statistically speaking, every time you cycle the power switch the math says that you reduce the expected lifespan by 1 day. But don't go worrying about it as you will replace your hardware LONG before any of that happens.

 

[Kremen]

Just use it and don't obsess over things that don't matter at all in the bigger picture.

However, statistically speaking, the largest number of failures, by far, come when turning your computer on as everything is coming from a cold, dead state to full operation in a fraction of a second. That surge is what causes component failure. Again, statistically speaking, every time you cycle the power switch the math says that you reduce the expected lifespan by 1 day. But don't go worrying about it as you will replace your hardware LONG before any of that happens.

This is exactly the view I was holding up until now.
"It is better to let it be always on."
But, I see now people have different opinnions about that.

Thanks everyone for answering my questions.