How bad is it to turn off my PC every night?

[grimlykindo]

Even though I've designed my PC to be as quiet as possible I still can't stand leaving it on while I sleep in my tiny room. It raises the temp in my room considerable with my 3.0 Prescott (PressHOT) idling at 44c :Q .

Anyway, I can't keep my door open at night cuz my roomate has THREE overly "friendly" cats that like to walk all over you while you sleep :roll:

So basically I've been turning off my PC every night to stay cool. Once winter here in Minnesota hits I'm gonna want it on at night, but until then I wanted to know how bad is it that my PC is shut off every night?

 

[imported_Kensai]

Not bad at all..

That's why you go AMD.

 

[JE78]

I turn my PC off everyday before I goto work incase it starts to storm here

 

[ValuedCustomer]

There's 2 schools of thought..
1.) treat it like a refrigerator
b.) treat it like a television

you can make a decent case for either.. there are good points and bad points to both. - I say if it heats up the room shut it down.

 

[daftpunkit]

no AC? Heh I like to come back to a 65° room and my old hot AMD XP 2200+ balances it out nicely.
But turning it off every night I don't think is good.

 

[otispunkmeyer]

i turn my pc off when ever im not using it

 

[theMan]

ive turned mine off every night for my entire life. it helps performance to have the computer boot up everyday. if you leave it on too long, it gets cluttered with junk. it also saves energy, and money. and in your case cools down your room. i dont see how it could hurt anything.

 

[dullard]

Originally posted by: ValuedCustomer
There's 2 schools of thought..
1.) Those who do distributed computing.
2.) Those who do not.

Fixed.


Shut the thing down, it's better for your hardware. Now don't shut it on/off a dozen times a day - in that case it is better to leave it on. <- Based on studies of computers in the 1990s. Clearly things have changed speedwise in computers since then, but probably not in a significant way for heat/stress reliability.

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

It isn't going to hurt anything if you turn it off every night, so long as you are forcing it off (removing power or something like that). If you shut it down properly (IE Start -> Shutdown), then there is nothing to worry about.
Tas.

 

[grimlykindo]

Yeah I kinda thought with all the new modern hardware it wouldn't matter as much. Also my computer boots up in like 10 seconds (unlike my old celeron 533Mhz that took 7 minutes)

Thanks for the replys I think I will continue to turn it off everynight until winter hits...

When its -5F outside my Prescott mini heater will be greatly appreciated!

 

[Pabster]

I've ran ALL my rigs 24/7/365 for the last 15 or so years.

Frankly I think shutting them down is a waste of time. But then I'm not too concerned with the extra electricity draw.

 

[AmberClad]

Consider yourself lucky . Even with my Prescott, the AC is turned up enough in my dorm that I have to bundle myself up in a throw blanket whenever I'm in my room. Just for comparison, my GeForce full loads at 75C at home. In my dorm room, it hasn't gone above 52C . It gets really uncomfortably cold when you try to sleep. You'd think they'd be a bit more concerned about saving power, but nooo.

As for the turning it off every night, no biggy. I've done that ever since I can remember. No particular reason really, it's not overly loud. Just a habit.

 

[Bona Fide]

I turn mine off every night...no hit in performance or anything. 3 years and still going strong.

 

[Topweasel]

I am lazy and just power off the monitor, If i didn't hate windows putting my monitor in sleep I would do that as well. Fans are the one thing to worry about, but i leave it constantly running so they either die or continue working. Whe you turn it off then back on if the bearings are shot they tend to make noises for awhile. These parts for the most part are made for 24/7 use for 3-10 yrs so I wouldn't worry about it, and with a A64 with cool and quite on this should make things even easier with power and what-not. This said their is nothing wrong with shutting down the computer and with any extended (days or so) with out use you should turn it off.

 

[CrimsonCutie]

System Up Time: 13 Days, 2 Hours, 17 Minutes, 51 Seconds

thats my answer LOL
but I do notice slight performance drops after 10 days or so... and i have not been useing it alot the last 13days... so it didn't matter. I leave mine own most of the time because of p2p and IM software. I think it doesn't hurt to shut down every day, it will save some wear and tear on your computer. Don't shut it down every time you walk away and boot it 17 times a day, just once at nite.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: otispunkmeyer
i turn my pc off when ever im not using it

Same here. Saves power. PCs can use around 150W. And even if you are doing something good, like Folding@Home, that still will use power (even more than if it's idling).
However, if you're going to be using it in the wintertime anyway, as supplemental heating, THEN go ahead and run F@H or something else like that, and help out Team Anandtech at the same time.

 

[Trizik]

As long as you're not turning it off or letting it stay on randomly you should be fine. Even then you should be fine.

I did hear that a routine is good because the hardware will adjust within a boundary. Leaving it on for two weeks and then suddenly shutting it down for a day and then booting it back on for an hour and then off for 6 hours and then on for two days and then off for five minutes and so on and so forth causes the hardware to expand and shrink without a pattern. I don't know if it's still true, but 10 years ago it was said that this would shorten the lifetime of hardware. It's best to leave your computer on all the time or shut it down on a regular basis (nightly) because your hardware won't experience as many unexpected physical changes.

I however, am guilty of not following a routine. My computers sometimes stay on for months at a time, other times go off and on periodically, and the rest of the time the pattern is so messed up I wouldn't be able to explain it if you asked. But they're all running fine and my old 400MHz is actually a 24/7 server right now.

 

[sourceninja]

Not that it matters, but solid state hardware only wears when it is cold booted or physically harmed (dust, screw driver,etc) So you only do "damage" to your components when you first turn the PC on (assuming you dont overheat). So freaquent reboots cause harm (in theory) but that harm is most likley a few less seconds of life in the 5-15 years of the hardware's useful life. Its just like overclocking. Running a higher vcore can damage the cpu slightly over the years, but not enough to really matter (unless you really up that vcore).

The only thing I have noticed is that most of my hard drive failures come durring spin up after a long idle period. But that will happen no matter if you shutdown at night or leave the PC on. So do which ever you want. How often have you had anything hardware related fail. Besides a powersupply, I have never had any componet fail due to use with the exception of hard drives.

 

[NatePo717]

I turn it off when not using it. Keeps my room cooler and cuts down on the power usage.