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krazykleo

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 17, 2013
196
1
Everywhere and nowhere
What do you do at night? Most of the time I shut it down but sometimes I just leave it on sleep.

Does it make a difference? Is one better than the other?

I do understand that when I wake it from sleep its loads up within 2-3 seconds opposed to turning on the machine from a proper shut down.

Thanks in advance!
 

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,541
942
There are dozens of "sleep or shutdown" threads where you'll find many Mac users run months at a time without shutting down. Either is perfectly fine. One thing to consider is that there are maintenance scripts that run on a daily, weekly and monthly schedule. If your Mac is in sleep mode at the scheduled time, the scripts will run the next time your Mac is awake. If your Mac is shut down at the scheduled time, the scripts won't run until the next scheduled time. If your Mac is always shut down at those times, the scripts will never run, unless you manually run them or change the default schedule. You can manually run the scripts using the Maintidgit widget.
 

Doublea6

macrumors regular
Aug 3, 2013
132
1
I'll shut my computer down every couple of months, but besides that it always sleeps.
 

Mrbobb

macrumors 603
Aug 27, 2012
5,009
209
Is one better than the other?

Better for the Human or machine? :D


Sleep all the time since 1998. I only shut it down if am gonna be away for days. To me, human trumps machine. Machine serves human convenience. Not paying big $ for the dang thing just to worry about it!

Once a while though, if u sense something not kosher, go ahead and do a reboot to "freshen" things up, DO NOT ask to restore your desktop.
 

DisplacedMic

macrumors 65816
May 1, 2009
1,411
1
i shut mine every now and then just to see how fast it boots up...otherwise it sleeps when i'm not using it. if anything starts acting up i go through my SHUTDOWNEVERYTHING routine: run history eraser, clear out the trashcan, shutdown.
 

AXs

macrumors 6502a
Sep 7, 2009
515
2
It's a laptop, and not a desktop - so obviously, I shut it down whenever I'm not using it.

Even if I run to 7-11 for 10 minutes, I shut down. I don't get why I would put it to sleep? I've got the laptop with the fastest boot time in the world at about 10 seconds.
 

Suraj R.

macrumors regular
Feb 17, 2013
179
1
Canada
I turn my 2013 Air off and on multiple times per day just because it takes no time at all haha. At night I shut it off however, and during the day it just sleeps.
 

jadAce

macrumors regular
Aug 10, 2013
204
149
Sleep during the day, shut down at night.

This sounds like a great option. It won't interfere with your work during the day (instant on when you open it).

IMHO, this sleep stability is one of the great features of the MacBook Air - no "hibernation" issues as in the PC laptops I have used so far.
 

beautifulcoder

macrumors regular
Apr 13, 2013
218
2
The Republic of Texas
Shutting down? Dude, why? OS X is a world class operating system that just works. I think you are simply draining battery with every reboot. Completely pointless, unless you still bear phycological and emotional scars from the Wretched PC.
 

flynz4

macrumors 68040
Aug 9, 2009
3,242
126
Portland, OR
I shut mine down whenever I leave it in a place where it might get stollen, such as a hotel room.

I use FileVault2... but there has been a reported vulnerability if the device is in sleep. I have also set a firmware password, so that vulnerability may be closed... but I still shut down when left unattended in a place where others could possibly have access to it.

BTW: I do use the in-room safes... but those are not too secure.

Losing a laptop would be an inconvenience. Identity theft would be be a disaster.

/Jim
 

cbautis2

macrumors 6502a
Aug 17, 2013
894
1,106
Sleep without question!

That's the beauty of MacBook Air and OS X where the battery doesn't drain unlike Windows laptops where if you let your laptop sleep for 2 hours, you've just lost 15% - 20% of the battery charge. Not to mention that OS X stability is bar none when it comes to uptime.
 

HarryWarden

macrumors 6502a
Oct 27, 2012
607
120
Sleep during the day, shut down at night.

That's what I do most every night. Sometimes I forget to shut down at night if I fall asleep watching a movie or something but the above is what I try to do. It takes no time to start up whether asleep or starting from a boot so why not shut it down when I don't plan on using it for 8 hours or more.
 

AXs

macrumors 6502a
Sep 7, 2009
515
2
I seriously don't get it. What is the benefit in putting your Macbook Air to sleep?

I understand with older computers it was a pain in the A' to boot especially with 10+ startup programs.

But what benefit could it possibly have? I'm new to OS X so am I missing something? Why are people so much in favor for leaving their battery-powered mobile computer on indefinitely?
 

Doublea6

macrumors regular
Aug 3, 2013
132
1
I seriously don't get it. What is the benefit in putting your Macbook Air to sleep?

I understand with older computers it was a pain in the A' to boot especially with 10+ startup programs.

But what benefit could it possibly have? I'm new to OS X so am I missing something? Why are people so much in favor for leaving their battery-powered mobile computer on indefinitely?

For me I have a lot of documents open like photoshop, spotify, web pages, etc. so for it would be a pain to close of them every night. Why not just have you computer accessible whenever you need it.
 

coldjeanzzz

macrumors 6502a
Nov 4, 2012
655
17
Shutting down? Dude, why? OS X is a world class operating system that just works. I think you are simply draining battery with every reboot. Completely pointless, unless you still bear phycological and emotional scars from the Wretched PC.

Why would you assume people are shutting down only when on battery? 99% of the time when I shut down I'm plugged in and I doubt there is much of a difference in battery consumption when comparing a sleeping machine and one on a cold boot.
 

AXs

macrumors 6502a
Sep 7, 2009
515
2
see I'm still not understanding.

It isn't accessible if it is shut down?

And it is really a pain to relaunch 5-10 programs? don't they run at start-up anyways? And even then, there is an option to reopen windows on boot.

I mean, it seems to me like you guys are not truly understanding how awesome the PCIe SSDs are... and are not making use of it?

I'm still baffled. Like I said, I shut down when ever I am away for more than 10-15minutes, provided I have nothing downloading/uploading or syncing.


Edit: Wait, so someone is suggesting that shutting down and booting will exhaust more power than leaving the device on 24/7??????
What?!
 

Saturn1217

macrumors 65816
Apr 28, 2008
1,264
834
see I'm still not understanding.

It isn't accessible if it is shut down?

And it is really a pain to relaunch 5-10 programs? don't they run at start-up anyways? And even then, there is an option to reopen windows on boot.

I mean, it seems to me like you guys are not truly understanding how awesome the PCIe SSDs are... and are not making use of it?

I'm still baffled. Like I said, I shut down when ever I am away for more than 10-15minutes, provided I have nothing downloading/uploading or syncing.


Edit: Wait, so someone is suggesting that shutting down and booting will exhaust more power than leaving the device on 24/7??????
What?!

Feel free to do whatever you want.

BUT

I don't think you are appreciating all the work Apple has done to make sleep the perfect solution for your computer when not in use. I NEVER shut down my computer unless absolutely necessary. I've been doing this since 2009 and no issues at all. I'm the one paying my electric bill and I can tell you the charging of a ULV laptop in sleep mode is not making a difference. Unlike previous MBPs sleep takes almost no battery life even when I leave my laptop asleep and unplugged overnight. And it is MUCH easier to open the lid and immediately start doing whatever you were last doing than to start up the computer again even if you check the open last used windows option (which isn't supported properly by all programs btw).

IMHO you are unnecessarily making life harder for yourself for no added benefit but if it makes you feel better that is fine. I spent most of a day doing a fresh install instead of the simple migration that apple recommends for moving to a new computer because that made me feel better even though many here with say that is completely unnecessary.
 
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