Do you turn off your computer each night?

[jlmarr]

We put it in sleep mode, or occasionally just put the display to sleep.

 

[funkychunkymonkey]

Mine overheated one night (sounded like the fire alarm) so its been turned off every night since.

 

[Nancy]

Left on, no sleep mode. My Dell laptop is 6 years old..it is slowing down some but has only been shut off during power failures for when I'm on vacation...and if it goes with me then it's on while there too.

I have no patience waiting on the startup ever time it gets turned on..so I just leave it on.

MY DH will shut off his desktop or if he's coming back to it in maybe an hour or so he just shuts off the monitor.

 

[DeluxePrincess]

We leave ours on unless we are traveling. One of DH's friends told him a computer gets more wear and tear if it is turned off and on all the time. So far, we've been lucky.

 

[Kitty 34]

I shut down every night and so does my computer!!!

 

[AnnaS]

I turn mine off every night.

 

[wdwfan16]

We leave ours on unless we are traveling. One of DH's friends told him a computer gets more wear and tear if it is turned off and on all the time. So far, we've been lucky.

Your DH's friend is misinformed.

http://planetgreen.discovery.com/tech-transport/turnoff-computer.html

"According to the United States Department of Energy, there are no computers on the market that actually last long enough for the negative effects of turning your computer off and on to affect anything."


You are doing more harm to the envirnment by burning electricity when not needed.

 

[Darsa]

So I guess my question is, just how much electricity DOES a computer use when left on at night, unused? Is it a large amount that would change significantly if you decided to turn your computer off from now on, or vice versa?

Oh, and I shut mine off unless a piece of artwork is rendering, then I have to leave it on because some of them take hours

 

[4nana]

For years I left mine on all the time and overnight...that is until fall 2004 when one of our wonderful Dis'ners, 'Emmasgrammy' (Lynda) , suffered a terrible tragedy. She lost her dear daughter and 2 precious grandchildren in a terrible house fire caused by their computer overheating . I'll never forget her sad devasation nor the heartache we all felt. Since that day DH & I turn ours off when we leave or go to bed. Better safe than sorry.

 

[wdwfan16]

So I guess my question is, just how much electricity DOES a computer use when left on at night, unused? Is it a large amount that would change significantly if you decided to turn your computer off from now on, or vice versa?

Oh, and I shut mine off unless a piece of artwork is rendering, then I have to leave it on because some of them take hours

According to this site:
http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/howmuch.html


Computers and electronics use 9% of your electric bill. We shut down our TV and other components, except the DVR, with a power strip at night. We do the same for the computer and accessories. So we figure we saw 4-5% of our total electric bill by using these two strips.

 

[puffkin]

For years I left mine on all the time and overnight...that is until fall 2004 when one of our wonderful Dis'ners, 'Emmasgrammy' (Lynda) , suffered a terrible tragedy. She lost her dear daughter and 2 precious grandchildren in a terrible house fire caused by their computer overheating . I'll never forget her sad devasation nor the heartache we all felt. Since that day DH & I turn ours off when we leave or go to bed. Better safe than sorry.

That is exactly why we turn ours off every night and when we leave the house too! I will never forget when that happened...absolutely devastating

 

[AnnaS]

It is something to worry about. Not as much concerned about the electricity being used/wasted but the fan going/overheating.

A co-worker recently smelled something burning by her computer and when she went to look, there was some smoke literally coming from the tower - or whatever they are called.

 

[nd5056]

Any electronic device or machinery can suffer damage on initial (hard) startup. When pressing the Power Button ON, we send an electric spike down the wire. The greater the voltage supplied to the power board, the greater the chance of frying something up.

That’s why CNC Machinery have much greater failure rate on power up then PC, the send 240 Volts down the wire.

So, Sleep Mode or Standby Mode is the preferred choice.

For those who keep their PC or Laptop ON all the time, depends on how dusty the environment is, please open up the case and blow off the accumulated dust and clean the dust glazed fans in your PC. Or have a Pro do it for you.

I’ve seen fans that accumulated so much dust, they stopped turning. And that what leads to overheating and frying components up, with the very rare possibility of catching fire as well. Also, some laptops had defective batteries in them that were overheating and catching fire as well.

Personally, my work PC is on all the time, my home ones are OFF, unless I render Video.

.

 

[pixiewings71]

We turn ours off when we aren't using it, and we turn the power strip off as well. We do the same thing with our TV/home theater system/DVD players. We had a Gateway that lasted for about a year and then it crashed, we upgraded to an HP that we've had for a few years now, it works great!!

 

[ugadog99]

That is exactly why we turn ours off every night and when we leave the house too! I will never forget when that happened...absolutely devastating

Yep, we do the same. I will never forget those terribly sad days around here.

 

[pilesoflaundry]

Nope, never have. My newish desktop goes into power save by itself after being idle for so many minutes so it does that at night but I almost never shut down the old desktop and I only reboot the laptop when it acts up and I have to.