Sleed Mode?

[jerusalem]

I have been building computers for a few years and I have always used an always on scheme. I've had computers run for years only shutting down if I'm going on vacation. I recently updated to windows 7 and forgot to change the power scheme and it went to sleep automatically. When I came home I thought my computer had shut down but sure enough I hit the power button and it was right where I had left it after about 30s-1m to reconnect to my network. Things have changed a lot in the computer world and I'm wondering if sleep mode will be at all taxing on my computer hardware with the quasi "powering down" action.

To sum up my question, should I leave my computer to always on or let it sleep while I am idle (set to after 1 hour of idle time now). Pros and cons to both would be appreciated as I assume there is no definitive answer. [/u][/u]

(P.S. it seems to cool down a ton when it goes to sleep *obviously*, which is the only reason I have let it sleep the past couple days while I was gone, it usually runs fairly hot, I live in AZ and don't have the AC on when I'm not at home.)

 

[idejason]

I wouldn't recommend putting your PC into sleep mode, especially if its frequently. When you don't need to use it, shut it down.

 

[WindowsGuy]

Dude putting your computer in Sleep/Standby mode can take up so much disk space. I would recommend turning off the Sleep mode, and setup a schedule to let the computer turn itself off.

Go to Start > Search for "Task Scheduler" without the quotation marks, create task, type in the task name, go to Triggers, click New, click on daily, set a time, click ok, go to Actions, for the program location, type in shutdown.exe and the text box will say "C:\Windows\System32\shutdown.exe" for the argumentations, type in -s -t 00 and click OK

Go to General, select run this program whether or not the user is logged in, and tick the check box that says "Do not store a password..... " in Configure for: select Windows(tm) 7, Windows(tm) Server 2008 R2

To clean the drive for free space, search for Disk Cleanup, select your OS drive (C:\)
select every box, and click Clean up, and click Yes when prompted.