Is it ok to leave your computer on for the whole week or is it bad for the computer?

Question

is it ok to leave the computer on for days so that i can download stuff, or does it shorten the life of the computer? and can it explode?

Answer 1

This question has been asked since the personal computer was still in diapers. Back then I'd say turning off you pc would be more prefered but with new pc's, components are better made and are design to run at a certain peak temperature so heat wouldn't be as big of a problem as it was say five plus years ago. Under normal useage and leaving a computer on for long periods of time such as a few weeks or months will rarely cause any harm to your computer or shorten the life of your computer, If your pc dies it's probably because of you or someone who did something they shouldn't have than because your pc was running idle for a few weeks. As long as you do a maintenance run(defrag, sys error, registry cleaning etc) once in a while and reboot to clear out any old memory junk then your pc should run smoothly. As for the concern for power usage, running a computer all day cost less than running regular halo light bulbs in your home. If you have an old CRT monitor I bet that thing use more power than your pc so turn it off, as for lcd, they use alot less power but still turn it off since it makes no sence to have the monitor on when not in use.

Answer 2

In the event of any power failure, fluctuation in voltage etc.
your computer will automatically shut down and in this process some of your system files may get corrupted. If you are keeping your computer ON for downloading big files, in the eventualities mentioned above, you may have to start download again from the begining. There are softwares available for downloading when the computer is ON. If you are using these softwares, when the computer shut down whatever downloaded till that time will be saved and when your computer starts the download will start from the point it was stopped. It is advisable to use such softwares to down lod files and date which take long time to download instead of keeping your machie ON for a long time without attention.

Answer 3

It might explode, it depends on what you are downloading!

I leave my computer on easily for a month at a time. The only time I shut down is going out of town or rebooting for an upgrade.

Screensavers have been 'old skool' ever since they went color, they're just for amusement.

It's up to you, but once every six months I drag my machine out to my balcony, open it up, and use an air-blower to get all the dust and stuff out.

Enjoy!

Answer 4

Yes, it's totally fine. If you leave it on all the time, it can shorten the life of your computer, but that's not a big deal for a week or two.

Answer 5

if the room is well ventilated you can leave your computer for a week... i believe it doesnt shortened computers life... when you leave your computer that long it take a rest normally called standby mode or hibernate mode turns off most of the devices in the computer(including the display, hard disks, and peripherals), but keeps just enough power flowing to keep the information in memory intact—information that includes open windows and running programs.Windows saves the information in memory
(including open programs and windows) to your hard disk, and then your computershuts down.

Answer 6

if you leave your system running constantly then there is one thing that you should do at least every 3 to 6 months to make your system last longer, that would be to buy a can of compressed air approved to be used on computer parts and take the cover off the sytem and blow all the dust out of the system and power supply. Dust creates heat and heat kills computers. When I worked at Gateway and people would send there systems in to get fixed you wouldn't believe all the crap that gets in those systems.(dirt, dust, bugs)

Answer 7

Actually there is a great debate on whether or not you should ever shut it off and cooling and reheating is very hard on computers. The camp is about divided in half...

I have had ones I left on for years and they lasted just fine.

Answer 8

Sure, it's fine to leave your system on. However, if your power is flaky in your area, you might want to shut it down. If the system suddenly loses power, the filesystem on your hard disk can be corrupted. XP can recover gracefully most of the time, but other times you can wind up having to format and reinstall.

Answer 9

There exist enough power interuptions to preclude the necessity of 'off' on MY computer! (except pop up blockers)
Just keep re-running cleaners routinely & I've had no trouble for two years plus 24/7 'on'!

Answer 10

It´s a good ask... my pc was exploded (main processor) and I Just leave it on twice a week... computers are strangers...