Choices for "power on/off" on computer?

Rozmataz

SGF, Supreme Grumble Framer
Joined
Jun 13, 2002
Posts
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Loc
Fingerlakes Region of NYS
It seems that my home computer has decided never to sleep and in the middle of the night the screen saver - which has a variety of BRIGHT colors - is acting up and since the office room is right next to the bedroom - it lights up and reflects ALOT!

So.... on my settings for the display, Power: Is the following correct?

Turn monitor off: after XX hours?

Turn hard disks off: never

System standby: never

Thanks,

Roz
 
On at 9:30 off at 5pm.

If your machine has a 300 watts power supply that three 100 watt bulbs burning 24/7, or 8 KW a day.

IMHO Shut it down unless your using it as a web server. It doesn't take that long to boot up does it?
 
Originally posted by Bob Doyle:
If your machine has a 300 watts power supply that three 100 watt bulbs burning 24/7, or 8 KW a day.
Just because your car has a 300HP engine doesn't mean it's producing 300HP at idle. That's the way a power supply works as well - it's the maximum it's rated for, and puts out whatever is required. When the system is idle the power consumption is a fraction (especially if the monitor is powered off).
 
David,

I just assumed that the computer was always working, and that I was the idle one!

 
What about just turning off the monitor?
 
I have been working with computers for over 15 years and build and sell my own systems.

What does the company recommend?

Seriously, you dont want your hard drive spinning all the time. Put that machine to sleep!
Unless it is an older machine Sleep (aka turn off hard drive, etc..) will really help your machine.

Time to set depends on hard drive model and other factors in your PC.
 
I turn mine on of the mornings.
Hard drive settings are 15 minutes
Low Power mode after 30
and ALWAYS off over night.
 
I've never been clear on the difference between 'sleep mode' and 'hibernate mode.' I guess my 98SE machines would hibernate, 'cause they refused to wake up until spring.

With XP, the sleep mode works very well but I activate it manually (by pushing this cute little button on my keyboard marked with a crescent moon) when I'm going to be away from the computer for more than an hour or so.

I get to tell the computer when to go to sleep and when to wake up and it gives me a sense of authority that I've never felt with my children.
 
Gosh Ron - I never knew what those little buttons were for! I should have voted for you as most helpful geek (just kidding MIke!).

The other buttons stand for World Wide Web (or maybe it's a zipper?) and Email? I never touched those buttons (never really noticed them...)

I turn my computer on and off all the time, but if I am waiting for email or working on something important and doing something else, I let it sleep and wake it up with the mouse.
 
Mar, your keyboard is going to have a configuration utility, usually accessible through the control panel, so you can set up those buttons to do pretty much anything but dust the house.

I have a little house button that takes me to The Grumble (there's no place like home.)
 
Hmmmmm... I'm confused. Again.

But I did turn the monitor off last night. Will probably take the path of turning computer on/off as it is used.... I was told once that you have a higher chance of burning out switches by doing this... is that still an issue?

On? Off?

I turn my computer at the store on/off daily and sometimes I hear a strange noise coming from the tower..... I ignore it hoping it will go away.

Roz
 
I leave ours on 24/7 (some are servers so they have to be up all the time), and reboot them about every 4-6 weeks. We have the power settings configured to automatically turn off the video card/monitor after 60 minutes of inactivity.
Control panel -> performance and maintenance -> Power Options -> Power Schemes -> Monitor 60, all others None

Some argue that turning a hard drive on and off puts a fair amount of strain on the motor. I'm not sure how true this is, but it makes sense.

I don't know


If you're hearing a strange noise from the computer when you first turn it on, it's likely a tired cooling fan on the CPU chip or in the power supply. (needs oiling or replacement) Other possible reasons could be a cd in the drive, a hard drive that may be on it's last leg, or several other things.

Do most of you leave your POS server on or off? We leave our Lifesaver machines on, as well as the Wizard.

Mike
 
we leave our home pc on "sleep" mode overnight, but occasionally it wakes for no apparent reason.
awhile back, our computer wouldn't go into sleep mode. the "shut down" dialogue box all of a sudden didn't even have the "sleep" option anymore. was really confused. called a tech, and they walked me through "reinstalling" that function...worked fine again.
shrug.gif

sooo...call a tech.
help.gif
 
With Windows 98, if the computer failed to awake from the sleep mode (it became the teenager mode) or would not go into sleep mode at all (the all-nighter mode) the system would give you the option to disable it.

Maybe sometimes it would exercise the option without consulting a grown-up (the rebellious OS mode.)

(I can't believe I was even nominated for Angie's geek category.)
 
Saw the entry about buttons that I never knew were there....
party.gif


So last night I pushed the button marked "sleep" . . .

My wife came downstairs at 1am and woke me up.... :D

Thanks Ron, I love that button now. It beats all heck out of trying to jamb a couple of Benedryl into the USB port.

I've got one of those Radio Shack (plug it all in) that when the computer goes off, it shuts down everything else too... works great except the external HD is plugged elsewhere.... so it spins 24/7. I wonder if it ever sleeps. And if so does it dream in binary or analog?
 
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