Q. Should I turn my computer off at night?
A. This is one of the most frequently asked questions I come across.
Lets look at it from different points of view.
If you turn your PCs off at night you will save some $$$ on your electric bill. If you have multiple computers running you may want to save the extra dough. There is also the possibility of extra wear on your components from extra dust collection in fans and overheating. Turning it off will slow the buildup of dust and allow components to cool.
From another standpoint lets look at updates, backups, virus scans and scheduled maintenance. It is more convenient to run these operations at night so it does not interfere with your work. It is also very convenient when you don’t have to wait for your system to boot up. With some older systems you might wait up to 5 minutes before everything loads.
Personally, I set my monitor to turn off after 20 minutes of inactivity and leave the PC on. I run regular backups at night and virus scans as well. Setting the monitor to turn off will save a little electricity and ultimately prolong the life of your monitor. The back light tends to burn out after a year or two on the LCD screens.
It is really your choice whether you want to leave it on or not. If you leave your computer off for too long you may fall behind on security updates. If you leave it on all the time you will need to blow out the dust from your cooling fans more often.
What works for you?
618 Gratiot
I turn my computer off for the night just about every 4 days or so. The monitor I use is huge and bright,, definitely a power-hog,, I manually turn it off if I’m not going to be on the computer for a while.
http://www.cokersystems.com
I have my computer on almost all day, but I do put it to bed at night. Cleaning out the dust that accumulates is something I need to get better at, but my computer is in a relatively seculuded spot. I enjoy the convience of being able to sit down when I have a chance to do something on the computer, without having to power it up over & over again, I will shut it down if I know that I will be gone for 2 or more hours, basically to let it cool down. My monitor(s) I use two, are turned off if I am not sitting in front of them. Nice to know I am doing that right at least. *U* K
Cleaning out the dust is fairly simple. Just unplug every thing. Take it outside. Open the cover and blow it out with a “can of air” or other compressed air. Focus on areas with fans and heatsinks. Don’t use a vacuum. It doesn’t get into the tight spots like the heatsinks very well.