Computers have been an important part of our lives for well over two decades. But to this day, it’s difficult to find a consistent answer to the following computer question:
“Is it better to leave my computer on all night or shut it down?”
So what’s the right answer to this question? Keep reading to find out!
The answer
It doesn’t matter.
That’s right – modern computers will not be affected whether you choose to shut them down at night or leave them on. Back when computer technology was first entering households, it was a good idea to shut down computers at night. However, as long as your computer isn’t more than 10 years old, this question simply doesn’t matter today.
The only difference between shutting your computer down at night and leaving it on has to do with power savings. If you’re concerned about the environment and want to reduce your carbon footprint, then you’ll want to shut down your computer at night to preserve energy.
If, on the other hand, you don’t care about your power consumption and would prefer being able to sit down and use your computer without waiting for it to boot, then leaving it on all night is perfectly fine.
Some people choose to blend these two choices together and ‘hibernate’ their computers at night. Hibernating a computer pauses all processes without actually shutting them down, but the computer still turns itself off. When starting the computer from hibernation, it takes only a fraction of the time it would take to perform a ‘cold’ boot.
A word of warning
Leaving your computer on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week can lead to some PC problems over time. You might notice minor glitches, slowdowns, or other errors start to pile up. These errors often occur because you haven’t restarted your computer in a while. Windows operates best after a fresh restart, so it never hurts to perform a quick reboot before you leave the room for a few minutes.
If these problems persist after you’ve restarted your computer, then you’ll want to download a program like PC Cleaner Pro to diagnose your problems for you. PC Cleaner Pro is the world’s leading tech support software program, and even the most technologically-inexperienced person can use it to easily cure common computer problems.
