making my computer last longer
- Thread starter waltone
- Start date
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FWIW mine goes off once a week wether it wants to or not 
Depends on the quality of your hardware. In theory, best to stay switched on 24/7. Heat expands and contracts your components so if you keep it constant they should last longer. Software is a different matter, my personal best with windows is about 3 weeks before it falls over itself.
In practice, I tend to leave the PC switched on but I restart windows every morning when I come to use it. If I'm going to be out of the house for more than 24 hours I turn it off.
In practice, I tend to leave the PC switched on but I restart windows every morning when I come to use it. If I'm going to be out of the house for more than 24 hours I turn it off.
2
2scoops0406
Tricky one this. Computers are increasingly a commodity item, in terms of software, turning it on / off makes little difference, my record to date is a Win NT machine left on for over 2 years with no problems. (apart from the OS going out of date). In terms of what I'd call a reasonable amount of turning off and on, I've never really seen any stats to suggest that in a domestic setting the MTBF (Mean time between failure) of components is unduly affected. For my money, turn it off at night, save electricity. We ensure at work that our lovely users turn their 80,000 workstations off each night, saves a few million per year in 'leccy costs.
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B
breezer
waltone said:
why? its probably out of date already
i find with windows xp i can leave mine on for days, with win 98, 18 hours then something would go wrong.
I used to have a pc with win 98, that never went wrong (yes i turned it on/off often) but it never went drasticaly wrong, it also didn't go onto the net.
but as i have xp they both go on the net no major probs (so far)
I would be wary of leaving pc on unattended in a home situation ... we have had reports of PSU's delivering sparks from there orificees .. hereabouts. .... Would be easy to affix a battery fire alarm close by, above the PSU air outlet I suppose.
My Dells have been on and off several times a day .. the primary one for near 5 yrs now, just replaced the PSU and added an extra HDD ... as a precaution ... probably as much chance of the new PSU going T#ts up as the old bu##er .. Except, it is allegedly, of far higher quality ???
Placebo, no doubt
My Dells have been on and off several times a day .. the primary one for near 5 yrs now, just replaced the PSU and added an extra HDD ... as a precaution ... probably as much chance of the new PSU going T#ts up as the old bu##er .. Except, it is allegedly, of far higher quality ???
Placebo, no doubt
waltone said:
Put it in a glass case and never use it, that way it will outlast you.
I've had my home pc for 5 years now, it gets switched on and off about 6-8 times a day, never had a problem. We have pc's at work which are left running all the while, just the screens switched off, same deal. Dont worry about it too much, life is too short. Your pc will be long out of date before it fails.
I have my pc set to hibernate when I press the power button (and the laptop set to hibernate when you close the lid). Everything seems to shut right down but it is much quicker to get back on it and any programmes/documents etc will be exactly as you left them. Does anyone else do this?
petewood said:
If you have a small hard disk, hibernating is not a good idea, as the process creates some rather large hidden files on the disk. So if you wondering where all you free space has gone, this would be the place to start looking.
Apparently, 'Hibernate' creates a file a little larger than the total amount of memory in the computer ... On the surface this seems to make sense, more or less the current state of the computer is saved to disk..' Because the contents of the computer's memory are written to disk when the computer enters hibernation, you must have at least as much available disk space as you have memory...'.... Said to be 'buggy' but that I suppose will be 'subjective' and could mean anything !!
2
2scoops0406
Hibernate can cause some problems esp on laptops. This is especially apparent when you hibernate your laptop, then undock it to take it home, then reactivate at home, the 'pooter can get confused, as it re-awakens to a different status than it was in when hibernated.
I work in a department of around 100 people in a company of over 100,000. Our company-wide instruction is to reboot once a week, that is it.
My record with leaving my own personal PC on, is 2 weeks on Windows XP. A friend of mine once left his laptop, running Windows 98, running for 3 weeks without rebooting and had no problems.
To the point:
If you want your PC to last the longest time possible, you need
1) maximum cooling: use a temperature monitoring utility on your PC, add fans where necessary
2) clean air: install filters on fans, if there are non present already.
3) invest in an uninterruptable power supply (UPS): this will filter out the spikes and troughs in your mains power supply, and ensure there are no "hard" turn-offs when you get brown-outs and black-outs.
4) If you use a PC in a benign environment (constant temperature and humidity, i.e. an airconditioned room) then it will last for a minimum of 15 years in a constant powered-on state.
However, there is no need to do all that. Your new PC is likely to last a good 3 or 4 years with no errors if you turn it on and off when you need it, whilst parked in a typical room.
My record with leaving my own personal PC on, is 2 weeks on Windows XP. A friend of mine once left his laptop, running Windows 98, running for 3 weeks without rebooting and had no problems.
To the point:
If you want your PC to last the longest time possible, you need
1) maximum cooling: use a temperature monitoring utility on your PC, add fans where necessary
2) clean air: install filters on fans, if there are non present already.
3) invest in an uninterruptable power supply (UPS): this will filter out the spikes and troughs in your mains power supply, and ensure there are no "hard" turn-offs when you get brown-outs and black-outs.
4) If you use a PC in a benign environment (constant temperature and humidity, i.e. an airconditioned room) then it will last for a minimum of 15 years in a constant powered-on state.
However, there is no need to do all that. Your new PC is likely to last a good 3 or 4 years with no errors if you turn it on and off when you need it, whilst parked in a typical room.
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