Does it matter if I turn my computer off?

[Integral]

The actual power consumption of a computer was covered nicely in the post just previous to this one. Schroder, give it up. ALL of the power consumed by a computer finds its way into the room sooner then later.

I am a working technician and have been for over 30yrs. In that time I have maintained and repaired a large variety of electronic and electro-mechanical devices. It is pretty universal that the best mode is for a electronics device to be left running. Failures and trouble comes upon start up. If you are a bit observant you can see this in even the simplest of electric devices.. A light bulb. How frequently have you observed a bulb to go out after it has been operating and at a constant temperature compare that to how frequently you see a bulb flash and go out on power up. The same mechanism that causes a light bulb to fail on start up is present in EVERY electronics device. Every time your computer is turned on every component must come to operating temperature, while this is happening they are expanding putting stress on all mechanical connections between differing materials. This includes every one of the hundreds of solder connections on your motherboard, video card, and power supply.

This said, it is still a reasonable risk to shut your computer down when looking at some hours of idle time. Just how many hours I really cannot say, 8-10hrs seems like a reasonable SWAG number. I do not think it wise to power cycle a computer multiple times a day, that seems to be encouraging the random failure of one of the many solder connections in the box.

The power consumption of an idle computer will vary with the computer. It is very hard to say since it is determined by the various power saving settings in a Winblows machine.

 

[DaveC426913]

If you are a bit observant you can see this in even the simplest of electric devices.. A light bulb. How frequently have you observed a bulb to go out after it has been operating and at a constant temperature compare that to how frequently you see a bulb flash and go out on power up.

How frequently have hospital staff observed babies being born and increases in hospital emerg room activity during a full moon. Compare that to how frequently staff observe babies being born and spikes in hospital emerg room activity during a waning gibbous.

Your and my example are both textbook cases of selective recall.


Not that I'm refuting your entire argument, just the DIY example you cite.

 

[schroder]

The actual power consumption of a computer was covered nicely in the post just previous to this one. Schroder, give it up. ALL of the power consumed by a computer finds its way into the room sooner then later.

OK. The heat transferred by a pc and by a space heater, which are each consuming the exact same amount of electrical power from the grid, must be the same, for all practical purposes. Any differences in the path for the heat from the pc can be offset by any number of differences in the path for the heat for the heater, and are far too complex to be calculated and certainly much too small to be measured.
I have thought of another question in relation to this, but I do not seriously pose it as an argument for a difference in heat transfer, only as a point of interest for research. I think the best science comes about from focusing on these “minor” differences, rather than focusing on the overall similarities. By its very nature, the pc represents an ordered system. From the cpu to the buss and the registers, disk storage, everything is clocked and organized, which is in stark contrast to the heater which is just churning out random, chaotic heat. The heater is perhaps the most efficient entropy generator there is. The pc is certainly generating entropy, and in light of what I said earlier, for all practical purposes just as much as the heater. But, with such a great difference in the way these two “machines” operate, is it totally unreasonable to think that on some microscopic level, the entropy of the pc is less than that of the heater? I think that is an interesting concept to look into, although it does go far beyond the intent of the original question.