chrissybabe Loc: New Zealand

I have noted that some people never reboot their computers. This applies to PCs anyway but maybe Macs too ?
It is not good practice to leave your computer on continuously. Works okay for servers although you should probably reboot them every couple of months as well. A server runs the same software all the time so doesn't clog memory with bits and pieces that Windows doesn't clean up properly. However a PC workstation often ends up running a variety of software and more to the point hosts a lot of restarts of the same software. You will get memory rot and eventually be told you are out of memory. More subtle but still present are other remnants left lying around by Windows. You will have a much better experience if you reboot at least once a week. I restart daily so don't run out of memory. Plus I have a large workstation with lots of disks and memory. Left running all the time does add up to a useful amount of change. Possibly a couple of hundred dollars over a year.

gary8803

Apple computer should be rebooted a couple times per week plus history cleared.

Tomcat5133 Loc: Gladwyne PA

Years ago folks left their computers on at work etc. And some of my family members left their computers on.

I have always had Macs and a couple of PC's. I always shut off my desktop a Mac 27 inch. I also have a rule that I will not
let the memory be more then 50% full. Preferably limit memory to 30%. I often reboot. Heat is the enemy of computers if I
am editing video and pushing the computer I shut it off during the day to cool off. I have treated my Mac's this way for years
and they last a long time. I upgraded my RAM to its limit on this 27". It wasn't hard. It is going on 6 years old.

The question makes me think that the computer is on all the time. Don't do that. Good luck.
My daughter left her computers on my grandson's HP and these computers are all gone.

sjb3

I use sleep mode instead of shutting it down.

chrissybabe Loc: New Zealand

Your mileage will vary depending on how you use your computer. With daily restarts my motherboard is well over 6 years old. Restarts, if you have an SSD as the boot device, don't take long - definitely not long enough to get the first pot of coffee started. I know that a PCs failure is most likely to happen at power on or off but I think that this as an issue has lessened over the years. Not sure just how much housekeeping Windows does when waking up from sleep mode but I suspect it isn't as much as during a full reload from scratch.

G Brown Loc: Sunny Bognor Regis West Sussex UK

My PC has a loud fan.....there is no way I can sleep next to it. It gets shut down everytime I stop using it. (Which goes against Linux advice) But hey....I dont sleep with them either.

chrissybabe Loc: New Zealand

Why not replace the power supply ? Modern power supplies are very quiet these days. Or check the CPU fan as Intels fans, although they last a long time, have been known to get noisy. Disconnect any other fan unless your case is very small and needs the cooling. Or fit a fan speed control and throttle it back a bit.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

True, and the same applies to most electronic devices - cell phones, routers, TV boxes.

olemikey Loc: 6 mile creek, Spacecoast Florida

I use sleep mode with a once or twice a week full shutdown.....I also have a switch on my hardline so that the PC (Laptops, tablets, etc. & use "airplane mode" for the wifi units) are completely disconnected form net. The only times I had issues with hacks and intruders was when I didn't disconnect, because the smart ones can start your stuff up and get inside....but not when disconnected, or in "airplane mode". Ccleaner (or something like it) to clean things and speed things up, and monthly dumping of the unnecessary crap. Reboot as needed....computers are happy, I'm happy, and my stuff is safe.

rfmaude41 Loc: Lancaster, Texas (DFW area)

I shut mine (PC) down every evening, and, reboot in the morning. Does a good cleanup of memory, etc..

Wellhiem Loc: Sunny England.

When I learned to programme, I was told that once you had finished with a variable, you should always free up the RAM it used. Evidently, in the early days, Microsoft never did that. So any RAM that was in use remained unavailable until the computer was rebooted. Although it may be apocryphal we were told that MS DOS would handle 640K of RAM and it was believed that that was more than anyone could ever use. This carried on through earlier versions of Windows that still used DOS under the surface right through to Windows 95. As newer versions of Windows applications were introduced, they were updated rather than re-written and the problem was never resolved. This is where the old joke about the IT tech always saying "Have you tried turning it off and back on again" comes from. These days the problem has been sorted. But it's still a good idea to reboot occasionally to keep up with updates. Also, some online sites such as Facebook that update automatically, don't release RAM until they're closed. You don't have to log out each time, just close the tab they're running in.

DJphoto Loc: SF Bay Area

Shutting it down and letting it cool off and then turning it back on can shorten the life of an electronic device (thermal cycling), rather than keeping it at a "moderate" temperature. This is similar to metal fatigue in a mechanical part. As the device heats up, it expands, and when it cools down it contracts resulting in mechanical stress. Additionally, there used to be a rule of thumb that every 10 degree C rise in junction temperature of a solid state device cuts its life in half; this is valid over a very wide range of temperatures. However with newer devices, this may no be as bad as it used to be. The bottom line is that heat is the enemy, as is thermal cycling. The way to mitigate this is to properly cool it and leave it on in low power mode. Rebooting does flush the memory cache and has little thermal impact, though it should reduce the memory usage and thus the heat. I rarely turn my desktop computer off, but do periodically reboot it. My laptop does get turned off all the time, because it's a laptop and moves around with me a lot.

n3eg Loc: West coast USA

I have my computer set up to auto-reboot every week. If left running, it hangs up every 9 days or so. Windows 10.