Help. Is it bad for you computer to shut it down everyday?

[Timoe]

Help,

Someone told my wife that it is bad for your computer to shut it down everyday.  I may be wrong, I dont know that much about computers but this seems silly.

It would seem that shutting your computer down and the allowing it to "restart" would be a good thing.  Is there anyone out there that can clear this up for me?

The only reason I can think of that her computer guy at her office told her not to turn off her office computer would be things like auto updates and such.  Am I right?

Thanks.

[SirPeale]

They're probably thinking of thermal expansion/contraction issues.  Don't worry about it.  With regular maintenance, it won't be an issue.

[Timoe]

What are these "thermal expansion/contraction issues" and does that mean that I should or shouldnt turn it off?

FYI, its a 2005 Dell running XP and its used for online banking, excel spreadsheets, web browsing and the occasional video game.

[danny_galaga]

an engine lasts longer too if its never shut down. but we do. theyre designed that way. i bet people in the power- generating industries spread these rumours around so we all use more electricity!

businesses often keep them running all the time. maybe it dates back to when you realy DID have to keep them on forever. i know at one place i worked we used to keep everything on all the time. yet  EVERY year we would have stuff die during the wet season because of lightning strikes/ power surges (the type of surge CAUSED by lightning strikes). so to me it would have been better to be in the habit of shutting everything down...

[screaming]

No, it's not bad to shut down your computer every day, as long as you're using the standard shutdown procedure (in Windows, Start -> Shutdown).  A lot of people compare starting up your computer to starting up your car and use that as an argument why you should leave it on all the time INSTEAD of shutting it down, but I think that's a little unfair.  Starting up your car does a lot more damage to your car than starting up your computer does to your computer.

When you start your computer:
- There's a teeny tiny bit more electricity being used to get everything going, specifically when your bios and Windows polls all your devices during boot up.
- Your power supply probably gets the most wear-and-tear from the starting up and shutting down.  If that's a concern for you, make sure your power supply is decent. You'd know if it wasn't because people on the Dell BBS would be all up in Dell's ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- otherwise.
- A particular section of your hard drive is getting read from and written to, which could wear it down after a very long time (decades, with today's hardware). However, this is no different than working on one Excel spreadsheet every day, for example.

These issues are so minor though, that most people don't even need to consider them. In short, unless you're turning it on and off all day long say, once every couple hours for years on end, you have nothing to worry about.  Your computer will be stuck on Windows XP SP10 since you can't upgrade because your CPU is too slow before your computer will break from turning it on and off every day. Then you'll be turning it into an arcade computer running MAME .175 (fortunately that will be when Golden Tee 2005 finally comes out in MAME) and unable to upgrade beyond that.

I did a quick search on Google and came up with this post that does a pretty good job of describing what the best practice is if you're concerned about it.

[screaming]

Okay, now that I realized I didn't really address your post and pretty much wdent off on my own tangent, here is my real response

It would seem that shutting your computer down and the allowing it to "restart" would be a good thing.  Is there anyone out there that can clear this up for me?

  Technically speaking, there should be no reason to restart your computer "just because".  If you feel like you need to because it's sluggish or programs are crashing, then you have a software issue that should be addressed.  Memory mismanagement is the primary cause of "sluggishness", which is IMO the main reason people restart thier computer "just because".  A fully patched Windows XP machine does a pretty good job of managing memory and most of the time the issue is with individual software packages, like FireFox, MS Office, etc.  If one of these applications seems unresponsive or sluggish, restart that program. You have to be careful though because some programs, like Outlook, LOOK like thier closed but if you view your task list in Task Manager (right click on your task bar, click Task Manager, then click the Processes tab), you'll see OUTLOOK right there taunting you.  In that case, you need to click "End Process" to really kill it.

DO NOT GO KILLING PROCESSES UNLESS YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO KILL IT! Clicking that End Process button can be dangerous to the stability of your computer!  Most of the time you won't permanently damage your Windows XP and a simple retstart will cure it, but generally speaking, go easy on the process killing.

The only reason I can think of that her computer guy at her office told her not to turn off her office computer would be things like auto updates and such.  Am I right?

  If you have Auto Updates turned on, yes, keeping your computer on all the time will make sure the latest and greatest security exploits are patched as soon as MS has a patch available. However, the next time you turn on your computer, Auto Updates will resume and take care of whatever it missed so really you're not doing yourself a disservice by shutting down your computer if all you care about is Auto Update.  In fact, I would argue that getting yourself a firewall, or one of these Home/Broadband routers that do NAT is better for the security of your computer than keeping itpowered on all the time just so it can get the Updates.

[Minwah]

Shutting down will help make your fans last longer!

I always shut down my PC's.  My thinking is pretty much why have something on if you're not using it...I know most people waste power but that's no excuse to do it on purpose.  Anyway, I've never had any problems, and I've had PC's at work which have been used like this for years and years with no maintenance/repairs whatsoever.

[Fat_Trucker]

Yup, I think you have to be fairly unlucky to have a PC die because you turned it on and off too often. My Old original 1Ghz AMD Athlon PC (that now belongs to my Dad) has been powered on and off at least once a day for the last 5 or 6 years without mishap.

All my PC's get turned off when not in use and I've never had a problem with any of them. (that wasn't related to a 3 year old pouring jam into the DVDRom drive anyway).

The moral: Always turn your PC off but keep young children at least 300 yards away from it at all times.

[leapinlew]

This is the age old electronics question...

I think the idea of shutting it down and starting it causing damage is related to the idea that when you turn a computer on there could be a surge that could cause a problem. Such as lightbulbs - yes, they'll just burn out if left on, but more often they pop when the lightswitch is switched to on.

I personally leave everything on. Mainly because when I want a quick donkey kong, or pengo game - I don't want to wait for the computer to boot up. Thats me - your mileage may vary. If you live in Florida a.k.a. lightning capital of the world, you may want to shut down/unplug computers.

Minwah also brings up another point - your fans will last longer. This is true. I built my mame computer with just 1 fan in the power supply just for this issue. No fans on the mobo, proc or video card.

[Howard_Casto]

There are benefits and drawbacks to either philosophy. 

All things considered, it's best to leave a pc on all the time. 

Why?  Back to the car analogy.  When you start a car a sudden surge of power goes through the car, the engine cranks harder and the starter motor, which really isn't designed to handle that much abuse, is put into overdrive to generate enough juice to start your car.  The less you start your car, the longer it'll last.  Unfortuantely for cars, we don't have this option to leave it running.  We eventually run out of gas.

Computers, on the other hand can be left on 24/7.  The only wear it'll cause on the computer is moving parts that are constantly running... namely fans.  But fans are like 5-20 bucks so just replace them every few years and you are good to go.   Aside from the extra strain put on your powersupply, silmilar to the car starter, extra strain is put on every single electrical component in your pc, including cards, your motherboard, and especially your harddrives/ cd drives. 

You see to detect hardware your pc sends full voltage through it for a period of time as opposed to signal pulses it gets in normal operation.  Harddrives and optical drives need full power sent you their motors upon startup   for them to be detected as well.  Basically every boot strains any resistors and caps on a circuit board and strains any motors on a disc drive. 

If you have an energy star compliant pc then keep it running 24/7.  If you have the monitor set to shutdown after an extended period then the  power consumed by the average desktop pc is less than a 60 watt lightbulb.  You can further conservation by having your harddisks power down when idle for several minutes.  I wouldn't reccomend sleep mode though as it never works right. 


My pc has been up for about a month now.  I do power it down about once a month though to save the fans a little.  With that being said when it is powered down, it's down for the whole day.  A rest means a rest.


Which brings me to my final point:

By once a day do you truely mean ONCE a day? 
Even if you don't agree with me, a pc should never be turned on/off more than maybe twice a day.  Because that's hard on the computer AND wastes power.  It's be like driving a block in your car, stopping at a store and turning it off, starting it agai 5 minutes later, going another block and stopping... ect for hours at a time.  Moderation is the key regardless of if you wish to keeep it on or off in it's resting state.  Just don't switch between them constantly. 

[dax]

Everyone else has some good ideas on this issue, however, there are much more important elements in making your PC reliable than whether or not you routinely power on/off the machine. 

The most significant of which are: CLEANLINESS and TEMPERATURE.  These two factors, if not optimized, will cause much more stress on your equipment and reduce the longevity and reliability.  If you keep the computer cool and in a clean, dust-free environment, this will go the farthest towards making sure the system is solid and long-lived.

[Howard_Casto]

Temperature yes... cleanliness no.  I've seen 15 year old linux servers chugging away with literally an inch of dust rest on their motherboards. 

And since temperature isn't really an issue unless your pc is outdoors or over a heat vent, I'd say both are really non-issues. 


Now humidity/moisture, that's another issue... but another rant for another day.

[Brad]

I agree. I have got 15 year old RS6000 machines running AIX and they haven't skipped a beat. they run 24/7 too. We had to add some more memory into into one last year. I warned them that I could NOT guarantee that it would start again. I took the cover off and I'm not kidding when I say that I could not see one single component. The dust was actually the same shape as the case cover so that when I took the cover off it just looked like another cover only dusty coloured was underneath.

A good clean out after, new simms and it started no problem. All this in a warehouse situated inside a freezer  complex with massive amounts fo moisture.  They just don't make them like that anymore =(

We've begged them to update it but they keep saying why fix something thats so reliable. It's hard to argue against it too LOL!

Brad

[danny_galaga]

There are benefits and drawbacks to either philosophy. 

All things considered, it's best to leave a pc on all the time. 

Why?  Back to the car analogy.  When you start a car a sudden surge of power goes through the car, the engine cranks harder and the starter motor, which really isn't designed to handle that much abuse, is put into overdrive to generate enough juice to start your car.  The less you start your car, the longer it'll last.  Unfortuantely for cars, we don't have this option to leave it running.  We eventually run out of gas.

howard, you may or may not be right but this analogy is TERRIBLE! firstly, the starter IS designed to handle that much abuse. and what is this 'engine cranks harder' thing? the start-up wear in engines is caused by 1) lack of oil pressure 2) tolerances being designed for a warm engine, not a cold one.

if the engine is running fine, and you stop it and start it again a few minutes later there isnt all that much more wear than if it had been running in that same time- the tolerances are at operating temperature, oil pressure is up (or at least oil is everwhere it should be). the starter will wear out faster in the same way your pcs fan will if left on- its being used more. but the engine will be fine...

[dax]

Temperature yes... cleanliness no.  I've seen 15 year old linux servers chugging away with literally an inch of dust rest on their motherboards. 

Seriously?  You actually think that having an inch of dust on a motherboard doesn't have an impact?  C'mon, please, common sense dictates otherwise, as well as my personal experience.  Plus, you say temperature has an impact.. well if there's dust and dirt clogging everything, that affects airflow and temperature.

Dust and dirt most definitely will wreak havoc with a computer.  It will gunk up sensors and floppy drive heads; it will cause bearing failure in fans; it will cause all equipment to run at hotter temperatures.   

[leapinlew]

I've seen 15 year old linux servers chugging away with literally an inch of dust rest on their motherboards. 

15 years old? Linux Servers?

I'm all for some exaggeration here and there, but 15 year old linux servers? Your hurting your creditability. I think Linux came out in 94.

inch of dust? I'd believe that before a 15 year old linux box

[Mark70]

Such as lightbulbs - yes, they'll just burn out if left on, but more often they pop when the lightswitch is switched to on.

I know that nobody really gives a squirt, but this isn't true at all.  At least if you're talking about incandesceant bulbs..... I know I know, shut up, this thread is about turning computers on and off.... But I say if you're going to use an analogy, make sure it's actually analagous.

An incandescant light bulb can burn (for all practical purposes) as long as you feed power to it.  It can also be turned on and off constantly without affecting it's life span.  The greatest enemy to the incandescant bulb is vibration.  Yes, it more than likely vibration that's burning out your light bulbs.  The vibration is causing the flaws in the tugsten filament, and the current is burning it up because of those flaws.  Incandescant light bulbs, by design, go in places like closets specifically because of their ability to go on and off without affecting their lifespan.  The other reason to use incandescant bulbs is because they're flattering to the human complextion.  There's your useless irrelivant architectural rant for today.

Now.

I've turned my computers on and off every day at home and at work for over ten years and never had a failure which was related.... well except I've replaced one power supply in all of that time.  But one power supply in all of that time is well within the law of averages to be considered for any other cause of failure.

There are as many reasons to turn your computer off as there are to leave it on.

In a corporate setting Leave it on becuase of virus updates and backups which happen in off hours.

Turn your computer off, ie. reboot at least once a week (at the advice of our IT company) because software is the weak link.  Memory leaks bog you down.

[leapinlew]

Such as lightbulbs - yes, they'll just burn out if left on, but more often they pop when the lightswitch is switched to on.

I know that nobody really gives a squirt, but this isn't true at all.  At least if you're talking about incandesceant bulbs..... I know I know, shut up, this thread is about turning computers on and off.... But I say if you're going to use an analogy, make sure it's actually analagous.

I'll defend my analogy. I mean, your probably right - you sound like you know what your talking about and I wasn't trying to make a pure apples to apples anology, but I feel it's close enough.   

http://www.factsfacts.com/MyHomeRepair/liteBulb.htm

[albybum]

I've seen 15 year old linux servers chugging away with literally an inch of dust rest on their motherboards. 

15 years old? Linux Servers?

I'm all for some exaggeration here and there, but 15 year old linux servers? Your hurting your creditability. I think Linux came out in 94.

inch of dust? I'd believe that before a 15 year old linux box

According to Wikipedia:
"The first version of the Linux kernel (0.01) was released to the Internet on September 17, 1991, with the second version following shortly thereafter in October [2]."

It is possible if 15 years was an approximation, but highly unlikely.

[leapinlew]

I've seen 15 year old linux servers chugging away with literally an inch of dust rest on their motherboards. 

15 years old? Linux Servers?

I'm all for some exaggeration here and there, but 15 year old linux servers? Your hurting your creditability. I think Linux came out in 94.

inch of dust? I'd believe that before a 15 year old linux box

According to Wikipedia:
"The first version of the Linux kernel (0.01) was released to the Internet on September 17, 1991, with the second version following shortly thereafter in October [2]."

It is possible if 15 years was an approximation, but highly unlikely.

Ok, if we are being technical, and it looks like you were.

September 17, 1991 is only 14 years ago.

[RayB]

14.5 years. Round it up to 15. OK?

Oh and lightbulbs, with their oh so fragile filaments are a poor comparison to computer parts.

I say shut down every night. A computer that runs for only half the day every day will probably last longer than one kept running 24/7.

[leapinlew]

The whole argument of "Is it better to shut down a computer when not using it" has been an argument since the beginning of computers.

Do what makes you comfortable.

I don't think there is a clear winner here. You really should do what you think is best. I leave all my computerson all the time. Computers at work are on 24 hours a day and they seem fine, my parents turn their computer off when they don't use it and they seem fine too. I don't see a clear winner. I keep mine on for ease of use - I tend to hop on a computer for a few minutes then hop off. I don't want to wait for it to boot up. Same with my mame cabinet - I'll want to play a quick game and I don't want to boot it up and then shut it down. To each their own.

As for the lightbulb analogy, I think it's pretty close to accurate. There are many fragile components inside computers as well.

[Xam]

I've got one computer I leave on all the time and one that I shut down daily...both run well and without problems.

Xam

[missioncontrol]

I shut mine down when I'm not using it... it's not broken yet....

[dax]

I've seen 15 year old linux servers chugging away with literally an inch of dust rest on their motherboards. 

15 years old? Linux Servers?

I'm all for some exaggeration here and there, but 15 year old linux servers? Your hurting your creditability. I think Linux came out in 94.

inch of dust? I'd believe that before a 15 year old linux box

According to Wikipedia:
"The first version of the Linux kernel (0.01) was released to the Internet on September 17, 1991, with the second version following shortly thereafter in October [2]."

It is possible if 15 years was an approximation, but highly unlikely.

Ok, if we are being technical, and it looks like you were.

September 17, 1991 is only 14 years ago.

As if someone has had Linux 0.01 running continuously!

I actually do have several machines that have been running continuously for 10+ years.  However, they're in clean rooms with special air conditioning.  I have some PCs that are that much older.  The other day I fired up my old TRS-80 Model III... last time I tried it, it was working... not today... oh well.  My Compaq Portable III still works; as does an XT, Compaq 386/16, and some ancient Novell file servers.

I do think turning a computer on and off will add some stress, but as I've said before, temperature and dirt/dust/pet hair and other things are worse.  If you have a hard drive that is starting to squeak, I might be wary about shutting the PC down if you haven't backed it up.  Other than that, I don't see it as being a problem.  If you leave a computer on all the time and it's connected to the Internet, you're more likely to suffer problems as a result of malicious net-related traffic than power cycling.  That's just my opinion.

[leapinlew]

I've seen 15 year old linux servers chugging away with literally an inch of dust rest on their motherboards. 

15 years old? Linux Servers?

I'm all for some exaggeration here and there, but 15 year old linux servers? Your hurting your creditability. I think Linux came out in 94.

inch of dust? I'd believe that before a 15 year old linux box

According to Wikipedia:
"The first version of the Linux kernel (0.01) was released to the Internet on September 17, 1991, with the second version following shortly thereafter in October [2]."

It is possible if 15 years was an approximation, but highly unlikely.

Ok, if we are being technical, and it looks like you were.

September 17, 1991 is only 14 years ago.

As if someone has had Linux 0.01 running continuously!

I know... just let it go. It's pretty obvious he was exaggerating.