QOTD: Do You Shut Off Your PC At Night?

[IzzyCraft]

I turn it off when i'm done but i'm usually always doing something on 1 of my computers but usually every other night all the computers get a rest or so.

 

[Guest]

I never shut my computer off unless I am leaving town for an extended time. I like having instant access to my system. In addition, I use a low power system for most uses, and turn off the monitor when I leave for more than a short while.

 

[dyrnwyn]

1000 watt power supply on the new rig and the most recent electric bill means it's getting turned off. got a lot of other devices in varying states, but unless there's a torrent going, or a RAID reconciliation, it's getting shit down.

 

[fausto]

has folding @ home helped to find a cure for anything? provided a new insight? because as far as i know this is a waste of energy

 

[Cache]

I've never had a hard drive (or any other component) die out on me because of turning the PC off each night. That said, both my wife and I have 750-watt power supplies, my daughters' PC runs a 400-watt supply. To leave all of these on--even in hiberation--would really eat into the family budget over the course of a month.

It's not about being green, as not paying money to the local electric company. Besides, seeing as we're all away at work (or school) for 10 hours each day, plus sleeping for another 6-7 hours, there really isn't THAT much time we spend on the home PC's (though not for lack of trying...).

 

[fpsgamingsa]

No I leave them on. 25 years of this and the ones left on always last longer. Thermal expansion/compression.

 

[cataclymistic100]

Uh.... sometimes I turn off my laptop but it tends to stay on longer than I would like. I try to turn it on standby but forget half the time. I tend to be high a lot and with people and well it just slips my mind and I just fall asleep.

My desktop is just busy downloading torrents I've had it less than 2 months its run time is over 47 days.

 

[San Pedro]

I turn off my PC at night and when I'm at work. I would use sleep mode, but since I was forced to switch out my motherboard, sleep mode hasn't been working right for me. 15 or so minutes after coming out of sleep mode it reboots.

Anyway, in Japan electricity is more expensive than in the states, and my PC sucks down a lot of power. So the avings are worth it.

 

[michaelahess]

I have 9 machines on 24/7 and 3 laptops that are on only when in use. One PC is my firewall though so it doesn't count. I have another 2 machines that are on only when in use as well.

 

[darkgoth678]

Yeah I turn her off at night, however I put here to sleep during the day when im not using it.

 

[NuclearShadow]

You can turn a PC off!?

 

[jivdis1x]

i have all 4 pc running 24x7

 

[the_one111]

I leave mine on most of the time..

 

[Guest]

I turned off my PC when I am not using it and only turn it on when I am about to use it. I also unplug my phone charger, most of the time, when I am not using it. I know some people even unplug their microwave when they are not using it. It takes time to get used to it but I am glad I am conserving energy.

 

[joex444]

Such a simple person.

Let me for a moment grant you the assumption that a steady-state operation is less stressful than a daily startup and spindown. I'm not too sure of this, but for the sake of argument let's say its true.

My solution to this problem is simple... create a RAID array. RAID1 or RAID5. The extra stress of daily spinup and spindown will be offset by the redundancy that is provided by such a system.

Personally... I run the following:

1.) 2x250GB RAID0 OS partition
2.) 4x320GB RAID5 storage partition
3.) 1x500GB eSATA weekly backup of OS

And all important documents I keep on a 16GB flash drive. There's also a 1TB Firewire drive thrown in just to round out the mix.

Basically... in order for me to lose data would require 2 of the 320GB drives to fail at the same time, or for a 250GB drive AND the eSATA drive to fail at the same time. Having a 250GB and 320GB drive fail would result in no lost data. Oh, and for what its worth, I don't need the eSATA drive on all the time. So there's your wear and tear issue solved. Turn it on one day a week for an hour for your backup and then forget about it. (I generally don't do that, but you could in theory. Its useful for temporary file storage since eSATA is of course as fast as an internal HD and well, my motherboard ran out of SATA ports).

 

[blader15sk8]

I put my PC to sleep and turn off my monitor, that way I can resume quickly when I want to get back on, but still save power while its not in use.

 

[paardengel]

I have a desktop that i leave on all day and night. My second desktop i leave off unless I need it. My laptop i put to sleep every night.

 

[jivdis1x]

Here is something to think about. HD is the most common part of the PC that does fail. Some comes with 5 yrs other 3. If you leave it on all the times, there is a chance you will get a new once before the warranty is up. I had a 10k raptor sitting in box brand new for 2 yrs. Use for it for 2 and half yrs then it fail. I came close to the 5yrs (2 sitting and 2.5 working)deadline. For those that say turn off the pc during the night or not in use, the HD will last you 5 yrs. It probably will because typically the pc is only being use about 3-5 hrs a day(home not work). 19-21hrs being off would translates into the PC would last you 4-7yrs. Running 24x7 gets me roughly 3yrs of use. An added bonus, I get a new one free, minus shipping. And that new one can go into the current system or parts for the next new build. lol

 

[leckig]

i cant believe so many of you leave computers ON! supposedly educated people believing in some myths? Do you leave your car engine running 24/7? Unbelievable, and I dont really care that much about some lost electricity and global warming, but I am very worried by your ignorance. This is something I never expected to read on this site.

Leaving 400W appliance running because of a legend that it will last longer... Does it mean that you also change your power saving setting to make sure the hdd never shuts down? Maybe even leave the monitor on?

Anyhow, I put my comp to sleep each time i leave it for more than 5 minutes and I had never had a hard drive failure.

 

[zshift]

I like to turn off my pc at night for the following reasons:
1. The pc is a giant night light due to my cooler master haf 932 and the xigmatek dark knight cooler with lights, my g15 and g5 light up too, and the monitor (samsung t240) on standby has a large blinking orange light.
2. the fans (3 230mm fans, 1 120mm, 1 120mm for cpu, vga fan (asus eah4870 dk top 512) aren't quiet...at all.
3. i dont see the point in leaving it on, never noticed any wear at all on any pcs. i still have a compaq from 1998 that runs like the day i bought it (EXTREMELY slowly (was $300 in '98) and the hdd can be heard from every corner of the house, but thats not the point) and i turned that sucker on and off only when i needed to use it.

the only part ive ever had fail on me was two sticks of samsung ram in my old dell, but the hdd is original and still goin. and the only time an hdd failed on me was when i accidentally kicked the usb cable when i was trying to backup my files to it (my heart stopped, i swear) and the clunk of death came louder than the grim reaper knocking on my door.

thats my 2 cents

 

[PCKid777]

To the people who say that their comps use XXX+ watts of electricity because they have an XXX watt PSU, please get a Kill-A-Watt meter and see for yourself that PSU wattage does not equate to at-the-plug wattage.

As far as leaving computers on, I always put mine to sleep for daily use. The desktop goes off when I'm gone for a week or more, the laptop to hibernate after a day of no use.

IMO, the constant wear and tear on devices can be just as bad if not worse than the minor wear and tear on devices at startup. I will hypothesize though that repeated on/off cycles each day could decrease the MTBF for a device though...

 

[Frodaddy6]

No. If I'm not using my computer, then it's downloading movies, music,pron, games, etc. Other than that, unless I'm cleaning the fans or upgrading hardware, I won't turn off my computer. To me, when a computer's off, that means it's garbage and someone's trying not to let that show.

 

[cadder]

My computer supplier for the past almost 20 years has repeatedly told me that his clients that turn their machines on/off every day have a higher rate of failure than his clients that leave their machines on 24/7.

I always turned my computers off, then about 1993 I decided I would leave my home computer on 24/7. I did this mostly so I could have internet access anytime without having to wait for the machine to load. After about 3 years I had a monitor failure and I had bearing noise in my fans and maybe in a hard drive, so I changed my plan.

My company started in 2000 and we bought 4 computers. We left them on 24/7 for 4 years. We had hard drive failures in all of them but everything else kept running. We bought 4 new computers in 2004 and still run them 24/7. No failures of any kind yet. One reason we run them 24/7 is so we can have access to them 24/7.

I bought my recent home computer in 2000. I turned it on/off every day. I have had no failures with it.

So my plan for now is to run my office computer 24/7, and turn my home computer on/off. When I get ready to use it I turn it on, I leave it on until I'm sure I won't be using it again that day, then I turn it off.

 

[Darkk]

I think it's a matter of personal choice. Don't listen to greenpeace or whoever. If you are going to be away from the PC for hours at a time, i.e. going to bed then it makes sense to turn it off for the night as you may turn it back on either in the morning before going to work or after work.

Every piece of hardware eats up electricity so you have to use best judgment of it's power consumption of it's worth it to keep it on 24/7 or wait 2 mins for it to boot up to check e-mails for 5 minutes.

I basically turn my PCs off at night except my PC based Firewall and another PC running as a fileserver and DVR. I use EarthWatts power supplies by Antec in ALL of my PCs and they DO make a difference in my electric bill each month!

 

[the_one111]

[citation][nom]leckig[/nom]i cant believe so many of you leave computers ON! supposedly educated people believing in some myths? Do you leave your car engine running 24/7? Unbelievable, and I dont really care that much about some lost electricity and global warming, but I am very worried by your ignorance. This is something I never expected to read on this site.Leaving 400W appliance running because of a legend that it will last longer... Does it mean that you also change your power saving setting to make sure the hdd never shuts down? Maybe even leave the monitor on?Anyhow, I put my comp to sleep each time i leave it for more than 5 minutes and I had never had a hard drive failure.[/citation]
Mines a 600w.

And that's if you believe in global warming..

Don't think I that I am against saving power, but I will never do so in the name of Al Gore.

I mainly leave mine on because I am on it at night off and on, plus I like to run updates and virus scans or leave downloads to run overnight.