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How do I get my cabinet to turn on?
ChrisK:
Just coming out of left field here, but: why turn the PC off?
Computers in sleep these days don't use much power. If you're using a modern monitor it has a sleep mode. The worst power sucker after that is your speakers, but most people don't use very powerful speakers.
Some computer hardware has trouble coming out of sleep mode (ie: driver bugs), but if your equipment can handle it you can save a lot of work by just letting the computer sleep, and wake it up with the joystick. I'm running my cab on a cheapo C2D laptop right now and this has been working great for me.
bkenobi:
And if you only use the machine for a couple hours a day on the weekend, you will be running the thing 100% of the time to use it for 2% of the time. I keep my desktop and file servers running 24/7, but those need to be ready when I want to use them. I don't want to wait a couple minutes for them to wake up and be ready to go. A cab isn't that critical if it takes a couple minutes to start. I don't disagree that they don't use all that much power, but between that and the wear on components, (HDD primarily), there's no reason to keep it on (for me anyway). Also, if a cab is on and the power goes out or lightning strikes, it's better to NOT have the thing on.
Richard_Nixon:
Kenobi, I've read different articles about what a computer will draw when sleeping and its basically nothing. No more than 10 watts if that even.
Wareing out your hard drive? During sleep the hard drive isn't powered, how could it get worn out ?
Power outage? The computer is basically off, no damage will occur from a power loss, the voltage holding the information in the ram will disappear, and the ram will clear. You'll simply have to do a cold start.
Lightning? If its plugged into the wall and there is a lightning strike on a line near you. It dosent matter if its on or not, somethings likely going to be fried. Your best bet against lightning is to unplug electronics, at the very least switch off the power bar, it could provide some security.
Unless youre talking about leaving it full on all the time, then disregard this post.
BobA:
Hey lighting has come thousands of feet to hit your house. A switch in the off position will do very little to protect your equipment. A very good surge protector can help your cab survive a meeting with mother nature. If you really want to protect your cab you have to UNPLUG it not just turn it off.
Richard_Nixon:
Your average rocker switch has about a 2000 volt dielectric strength. Lightning is somewhere in between 10-100 MV. You gotta hope that other 99.998 MV went somewhere else.