Ever leave your PC on?

[Seeker]

Originally Posted by Broken Arrow

I completely agree with the statement regarding the difference between hibernate and standby....

Unfortunately, I have not had a lot of luck with Hibernate myself. XP's implementation, at least on my PC, is buggy as crap. There have been times where it won't shutdown. There are times when it will shutdown and then it won't boot up right. And don't even get me started with people who uses it at work. I just tell them to avoid.

In my personal opinion, it's much easier to practice basic computing hygiene, which is to save all your work, and maybe even implement incremental backup procedure before putting the computer on standby.

Standby has worked flawless for me so far, on both desktops and laptops. So, that's what I use.

Have you patched for hibernation? WinXP Pro and WinXP Home Ed on computers with 1 GB of RAM (or more) needs to be patched:

Download details: Windows XP Patch: Hibernation Problem on Computers with 1 GB of RAM

[Broken Arrow]

Hrm, I'll check that tonight. Thanks for the tip!

[ea1776]

If you are using Windows, goto Control Panel -> Power Options.

Turn off the monitor after 20 minutes of no use.
Turn off the hard drives after 2 hours of no use.
System hibernate after 3 hours of no use.

[cicy33]

Originally Posted by kork13

I'm with project on this one... I shut down maybe twice a month... Otherwise, I always use hibernate.

I have found that if we don't shut down at least once a day and reboot the computer kinda freaks out. Of course we are on the internet frequently, I run firefox since ie tends to just shut down at random! I do believe that firefox has a hidden pane that causes the problem. I have occasionally when shutting down or rebooting seen the box that states closing pane or something like that. Maybe I need to reinstall firefox?

[nim3]

I dont leave my pc on

[Broken Arrow]

Originally Posted by cicy33

I have found that if we don't shut down at least once a day and reboot the computer kinda freaks out. Of course we are on the internet frequently, I run firefox since ie tends to just shut down at random! I do believe that firefox has a hidden pane that causes the problem. I have occasionally when shutting down or rebooting seen the box that states closing pane or something like that. Maybe I need to reinstall firefox?

That really surprises me....

Not the shut down part. I also shut down daily too.

I am on Firefox both at work and at home... and have had very few problems.... It's only when I am running in conjunction with my MP3 player and a game or some other combination that I have problems. By itself, next to none.

What exactly does this closing pane say?

[geojen]

I always use hibernate, but we have laptops, so usually they aren't plugged into the way anyway.

IMHO, leaving your pc on overnight is a total waste of energy and a small thing that one can do to lesson their impact on the environment.

[PauletteGoddard]

I should make a habit of turning off my PC. I leave it on if I'm downloading a large file (of course, public domain).

My spouse leaves his workstations on, but as he works at home, and is on call on occasion 24/7, I do not see the $ saved on electricity as a win for us if it takes him seven minutes to boot up for a client whose need is so urgent that my spouse must be taken out of bed at 3:15 a.m.

[Broken Arrow]

Originally Posted by PauletteGoddard

I should make a habit of turning off my PC. I leave it on if I'm downloading a large file (of course, public domain).

I do that too. That or lending my computer to distributed computing projects (like the Human Genome project one time). Again, for me, I don't use power-saving features (except 20 minutes for the monitor) because if it IS left on, it's left on for a reason. Otherwise, I'll manually shut it down every night.

[PamelaB]

I use a little program called local cooling to help monitor my power usage. It has several preset options to control your computer. Check the link in my signature.

[BillsGirl]

We put our main pc in sleep mode and turn the monitor off.... it's bad for a computer to constantly be turned off and on... but if we aren't going to use it for a while we'll shut it off... our laptops get turned off every night!

[tomhank17]

Well I don't keep my pc on. As soon as i m off with work i close it. And there are some conditions in which you have to leave te computer on but in this case you should turn off the monitor. Because for sure it will increase the bill although not to that extent. And also it is waste of energy which is a cause for global warming. So guys please use electricity carefully and help the environment.

[garilon]

You should switch both off at the wall especially if you monitor has a stand by light

[cicy33]

Originally Posted by Broken Arrow

That really surprises me....

Not the shut down part. I also shut down daily too.

I am on Firefox both at work and at home... and have had very few problems.... It's only when I am running in conjunction with my MP3 player and a game or some other combination that I have problems. By itself, next to none.

What exactly does this closing pane say?

Something like closing hidden pane. Can't remember exactly. I don't play games on firefox cuz mostly the games sites won't support it

[leighangela]

My electric bill went down $10/mo when I started turning my computer off every night.

[Broken Arrow]

Originally Posted by leighangela

My electric bill went down $10/mo when I started turning my computer off every night.

That's like giving yourself $120 every Christmas. Nice!

[MomofFour]

Originally Posted by leighangela

My electric bill went down $10/mo when I started turning my computer off every night.

Wow! I have a bad habit of never turning off my computer, I think I will try to change my habit!

[cicy33]

I have started turning it off at night on a more regular basis. Before we just rebooted during the day. We do leave it on during the day usually as it takes about 5 minutes to fully load.

[VickiO100]

I got tired of making sure the computers were shut down every night so I set up a scheduled task to turn each one off at 10:00 pm. Here are the steps (looks worse than it is):

1. Got to My Computer-->Control Panel.
2. Select Scheduled Tasks.
3. Double-click Add Scheduled Task.
4. The wizard will appear. Click Next.
5. Click Browse.
6. Type "%SYSTEMROOT%\system32\shutdown.exe" in the file name box and Click Open.
7. Select "Daily" on the next screen. You can leave the default task name or type in another name. Click Next.
8. Select the time you want the task to run, how often and when you want it to start. Click Next.
9. Enter the user name and password if you know it, otherwise just click next.
10. Check "Open advanced properties for this task when I click Finish" and Click Finish.
11. When the Advanced Properties box opens, add "-s" (without quotes) to the end of the file name in the Run box. Check the "Run only if logged on" box. Click OK.

Between doing this and putting CFLs in all of my light fixtures, I have reduced my electricity usage by 100 kw per month, which obviously saves money too.

[aevans1206]

My husband insists on leaving the computer on for "computer health" reasons, but he's very old school on that front. I think we should shut the computer down.

I started unplugging our toaster and coffee maker, etc. Our electric bill went down about $6. This reminds me that I need to make an effort to shut off all of the little doodlie-bobs around the house before I leave in the morning and before we go night night