Is there any good reason not to turn a computer off overnight?

something people might want to download a large file so it takes overnight to do so.

apart from that, i jsut find it troublesome to shut the computer. When i was in the university, i face the computer all day long at home, the first time i do when i wake up is looking at screen and switch on some music. so i just leave the computer on to save the trouble of waiting windows to load.

Not even that but the parts in your computer have a mean time of failure. If you’re not doing something at the computer, you will probably want to turn it off. Otherwise, even while you aren’t using it, you’re getting closer to having one of your parts break.

Too much dust can make computers work improperly. When you’re sleeping, you are pulling dust in that machine all night long.

I would only leave it on if I was downloading something big.

I think that setting conservative “sleep” settings can bridge the divide between power/wear-n-tear and usefulness. Set it so that 30 minutes of non-use sleeps the whole system, and that 10 minutes sleeps the display. Or even briefer! You don’t have to “close up shop,” as it were- saving and cleaning up everything.

Macs run maintenance routines at 12 am (clearing temporary files and cache), but I think that they do them during the day if they’re off at midnight.

@mea was right about big files- for torrents or even massive, many-gigabyte local transfers can take hours and hours.

Also, I have a DVR peripheral, so my computer wakes up to record.

Turning the computer on is a nuisance. But it’s healthier for the computer if she can take a break every now and them.

@tonedef: Great answer. I always forget about sleep mode. I’m going to start using that more often.

Due to an answer I received here, I now hibernate my cpu every night. It’s a great compromise between saving time and saving energy.

Every time I set the sleep/hibernate mode it gets ‘un-set’! Drives me crazy!

Edit: Oops, I forgot to answer. I do all my updates and scans in the wee hours, so I never turn it off overnight. About once a week I turn it off and give it a rest.

The internal components flex as they cool down and warm up. Leaving the computer on helps it maintain its internal temperature overnight and causes less wear on those components, extending the life of the computer.

@bodyhead With the dust issue that can actually be fixed fairly easily. The fan that is located in the rear of the tower can be switched in the opposite direction. This way the fan blows air out of the computer tower. It keeps dust out while allowing the CPU to remain cool.

@jdegrazia Some reasons for keeping the computer on overnight include large file downloads (as stated), if you have a lot of programs that startup when the computer turns on sometimes it takes less time to leave your computer on then to wait for the computer to boot up, finally, you may need to hop on to check something quickly and you don’t have a lot of time to wait for the computer to bootup.

@hypeserver….wonder why the computer manufactures don’t install the fans that way….?

Thanks for the answers everyone. Seems like there aren’t any serious mechanical reasons for keeping the machines on. It doesn’t hurt them to turn off. So, if not wasting electricity is the goal, then we should make sure we turn everything off. Sound right?

Not sure why they don’t do it that way snoopy, but it’s a trick that I use on both of my desktop PCs.

@hypeserver. Well it certainly makes sense to me…..airflow is airflow. It would actually seem to make more sense to pull junk out of the tower as opposed to sucking it in…..

I took apart my tower to take out the hardrive….to recycle the remainder….after 10 years, it was filthy

You’re supposed to clean out your computer from dust every month or so to prevent dust build up. You should probably even clean it more than that. Otherwise dust can cause some parts to overheat and fail. jdgrazia it’s more of a personal preference if you want to keep the computer on. If you think about it most computer’s don’t use a lot of Watts however the screen sucks up a ton of power. So if you decide to leave the computer on overnight you should turn the screen off and enable the computer’s “sleep” mode. The sleep mode allows the computer to stay running, but with minimal power usage.

@hypeserver What about laptops (RE cleaning)?

snoopy You really don’t need to worry about laptops since the vents aren’t as open to dust as the rear or front vents on a desktop computer.

I hibernate it every night unless im Dling something big on transmission.
I hate shutting down and then rebooting, its too much of a pain. Hibernate/sleep ftw.