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XP screensavers a problem? not sure
MameMaster!:
--- Quote from: Druin on September 14, 2004, 10:23:48 pm ---only thing is when I end up being away but didn't plan on it, it would be nice to have it time out after the 20minutes if I don't come back. It happens.
Well once I get a real system dedicated to mame I won't worry about it, it'll be meant to run 24/7 with an active screen, I'd be turning screen saver off. I think for me a part of the arcade experience will be to be able to come home to a running arcade machine, complete with attract demo sounds (sometimes). It would kind of cheapen it to have to go boot itup. I already have lived with a 24/7 computer philosophy for as long as I can remember, at least a decade.
I only turn them off when they crash beyond recovery and I am forced to hold the power button for 4 seconds!
--- End quote ---
...I've always been concerned to keep my mame machine running for days/hours at a time....you never have any performance problems?....any thing wear out prematurely?
MameMaster 8)
Druin:
The only thing I ever really had fail was hard drives, 3 in my 13 years of running PCs like this...and I've owned...let me count.....
40 Meg Western Digital (yes I had to think about that twice)
80 Meg Seagate (very smooth running)
270 Meg Quantum
270 Meg Quantum
1.2 Gig Seagate
2.1 Gig Quantum SCSI
2.1 Gig Quantum IDE
4.3 Gig Seagate (FAILED)
10.1 Gig Western Digital (Still running in slave PC)
13 Gig Western Digital (Still running in slave PC)
45 Gig Western Digital (FAILED last month)
80 Gig Western Digital (FAILED a few years ago)
120 Gig Western Digital (Running in main PC right now)
120 Gig Western Digital (Running in main PC right now)
200 Gig Maxtor Serial ATA (Replaced the 45gig, running in main PC right now)
So who knows, I don't attribute my failed hardware to running 24/7, how would all the businesses out there survive....especially those porn sites!
DougHillman:
FWIW, I've owned plenty of systems over the years that are left on basically 24/7/365 and am currently experiencing my first ever hard drive failure.
Just as with an automobile engine, the hardest part of its life is during the startup phase. Personally, I think you extend the life of most electronic components if you minimize the startup/shutdown. How many lightbulbs you ever seen that just blow out while they're on? Most pop when they're being turned on.
cdbrown:
Most companies leave their PC's on all the time and only use power saving options on the monitor. I never use power saving on the hard drive for the pure porpose of not powering down and up this critical part of the system. In the world of reliability - most things fail on demand - ie when you turn them on. Also a lot of compenents are expected to fail within the first few weeks of operation. Generally if they don't fail during the initial period they will work for a very long time - generally. Can you tell I've spent time looking through failure data and failure curves.
Howard_Casto:
About screensavers... you think you don't need them... think again! ALL displays suffer from burn-in if a static image is left on the screen long enough ESPECIALLY lcds, televisions, and arcade monitors. The trick is not to let windows handle the screensaver. I think the major fes support external windows screensavers at this point. They won't interrupt your game as the fe is controlling the saver, not xp.
(For the record arcade@home is not a major fe. Try something less "windowsy", you might like it.)
Power saving generally won't work with arcade monitors or televisions, so if you have a cabinet, you should really be running some kind of screensaver if you leave it on 24/7 or pause for extended periods of time.