Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Turning off computer VS putting it to sleep
- Thread starter mingspace
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Put it to sleep, it's what it was designed to do. If you use your machine more than about once every two days then merely put it to sleep rather than shut it down. If you're not going to use your machine for more than two days then shut it down. That's a pretty good rule of thumb I find.
The advantage of sleeping it is that it'll wake up quickly and when it does wake up, it'll run the system's maintenance tasks that should have been run at 3:00AM when, no doubt, your Mac wasn't awake. If you shut the Mac down, it won't catch up on these tasks automatically.
During sleep, the only components getting power are the RAM and parts of the logic board (and the sleep light obviously). Therefore, it has no advantage over shutting down in terms of preserving the moving components of your Mac.
The advantage of sleeping it is that it'll wake up quickly and when it does wake up, it'll run the system's maintenance tasks that should have been run at 3:00AM when, no doubt, your Mac wasn't awake. If you shut the Mac down, it won't catch up on these tasks automatically.
During sleep, the only components getting power are the RAM and parts of the logic board (and the sleep light obviously). Therefore, it has no advantage over shutting down in terms of preserving the moving components of your Mac.
the vast majority of user's i'd say put thier macs to sleep.
sleeping it does it no harm really. turning it on and off frequenly might actually be worse in some cases. although if you won't be using it for awhile (days) its always better to turn it off.
sleeping it does it no harm really. turning it on and off frequenly might actually be worse in some cases. although if you won't be using it for awhile (days) its always better to turn it off.
That's assuming it's not plugged in when it's asleep.
If it's draining more than 3-4% overnight, asleep, without a power plug, and much more than 10% over the course of a day, however, there is something wrong with the computer / battery.
I sleep both my Macs and very rarely shut them down.
You are still using power when you don't need to and you are contributing to global CO2 (if you're that sort of person). However I doubt the average Mac or PC user cares about stuff like that. I shut down or hibernate my machines which don't have to run 24/7 every day.
I find hibernate very handy on Windows - no power usage when not in use, fairly fast resume. There seems to be no equivalent function on Mac (unless someone can tell me otherwise which would be great), so I've shut them down every day.
I find hibernate very handy on Windows - no power usage when not in use, fairly fast resume. There seems to be no equivalent function on Mac (unless someone can tell me otherwise which would be great), so I've shut them down every day.
What about when transporting your Mac? Do you turn it off before you put it into a carrying case? (I'm still a month away from my Mac getting here, but I'm curious as to the affect sleeping it, and putting it into the case will have.)
Would it wake back up in the case?
Would it wake back up in the case?
It wouldn't wake up while in the case, you have to lift the lid up to do that, and I would be very surprised if that happened in a case.
Personally, when my MacBook's in transit, I turn it off, just for my peice of mind. Theres hardly anything thats getting power when it's asleep, as stated earlier, but I just prefer to have my MacBook stone dead, rather than asleep.
Personally, when my MacBook's in transit, I turn it off, just for my peice of mind. Theres hardly anything thats getting power when it's asleep, as stated earlier, but I just prefer to have my MacBook stone dead, rather than asleep.
I always transport my iBook sleeping. I really never turn it off for transport. Not an issue.
One, it won't wake up unless it opens. This won't happen inside a case with either the magnetic latch or the mechanical one.
Two, the hard drive is the sensitive component, and it's off while sleeping, so there is no additional danger of damage with it sleeping than with it off.
One, it won't wake up unless it opens. This won't happen inside a case with either the magnetic latch or the mechanical one.
Two, the hard drive is the sensitive component, and it's off while sleeping, so there is no additional danger of damage with it sleeping than with it off.
The resume from hibernation in XP shouldn't be any quicker than shutting it down completely as it essentially is doing just that - only it saves a file to your hard drive with the settings for how it was last used so it'll resume that way. Its not so much a time saver (as suspend/sleep can be) but more convenience of not having to re-open applications/windows, etcs..
I typically let my MBP sleep overnight so it runs all the handy, dandy scripts and such, but then do a shut-down when I place it in its sleeve for transportation to and from work each day.
am I right in thinking that when you "sleep" it the hard drive is still spinning?
If so, then it is probably a better idea to shut it down before you transport it majorly, like, to the office or whatever..
If so, then it is probably a better idea to shut it down before you transport it majorly, like, to the office or whatever..
This is from the Apple MBP User Guide:
And I also came across on apples site this which answers some other questions:
And I also came across on apples site this which answers some other questions:
Alright, when I'm downloading something that will take a while, I usually leave my macbook on all night (not letting it sleep). There was a period where it didn't sleep (more than an hour) for probably 10 days. is this a bad idea, or does it not really matter that much? I'm trying to cut back on it now, just so I can run the scripts and stuff, but just for future reference.
Also, the daily scripts that Cocktail runs, are they the same that the macbook automatically runs in the night?
Thanks.
Also, the daily scripts that Cocktail runs, are they the same that the macbook automatically runs in the night?
Thanks.
Try the 'deep sleep' widget. It just invokes the same hibernate to disk that the newer macs invoke when they're sleeping and run out of power. I've used it a fair bit on my MBP, and it's been great. I prefer it for the same reasons -- if I'm going to be away from my mac for a while, there's no reason to waste the energy just powering the ram, it comes out of hibernate faster than booting from cold, and my apps are all in the state I left them in.
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/20120
You must have one of those super-duper Windows PC's, because this is directly from Microsoft.
I don't hibernate my Windows desktop, so I can't provide any personal experience either way... I'm just here for the free food.
Sleeping does waste electricity though. Nobody has brought that issue up yet. Maybe nobody is bothered. Yes I know it is only sleeping but then how many other products in your house is sleeping?
My dad hit the roof when he got the electricity bill one month and he was told by the operator over the phone that he could save at least 10% on future bills by simply by turning off everything that was sleeping in his house.
(This was after I had told him to do it (when I lived there) because everything in the house was on standby. Those little LED's do waste some power.)
I only mention it because it is an important issue in this day and age.
I send my laptop to sleep all the time but I make sure I disconnect from the mains every time I do.
My dad hit the roof when he got the electricity bill one month and he was told by the operator over the phone that he could save at least 10% on future bills by simply by turning off everything that was sleeping in his house.
(This was after I had told him to do it (when I lived there) because everything in the house was on standby. Those little LED's do waste some power.)
I only mention it because it is an important issue in this day and age.
I send my laptop to sleep all the time but I make sure I disconnect from the mains every time I do.
That is however false logic, because you still use the exact same amount of energy!
I mean, if you put it to sleep the energy used by the sleep function is the same regardless of the energy source. When you wake it up, you still have less battery and then proceed to charge quicker than you otherwise would.
Besides which, carging a battery in the first place is extremely inefficient as it used more energy to charge than it uses!
I'm not particuarly careful myself however. I leave all mine on sleep; if only the government would support better methods of energy creation instead of allowing oil companies to buy out scientists' breakthrough ideas and never using them, we'd all be ok.
I can't see how that saves any power. Mind you I'm not an electrical engineer, and I'm often wrong with this kind of stuff, but it seems to me that the battery is going to be depleted while it's sleeping and will have to be refilled when plugged back in, consuming more power then it normally would if running with a full battery. If anything I think it might use more power since batteries aren't 100% effective at storing electricity.
That surprises me! Maybe it's because I left all the startups loaded on my Acer notebook, but starting from "hibernate" is much quicker than a full startup - about 1/2 the time.
iBorg
Its possible.. My only windows machine is a desktop at home and I don't use hibernate - I just leave it on all the time...
I'm just going by what it said.. I would have thought it would be even longer than the normal startup/shut down since before it can go into its hibernate state it needs to write everything from RAM to the drive - but I guess thats not a slow process at all....
I also don't know how Microsoft measures 'startup' - Do they start with pressing the power button or post-BIOS? how do they measure 'ready' status - when you see the Windows Logo? Ability to log in? Everything completely loaded and hourglass goes away..? I'm sure their measurement methods are also subjective but its the real end users that use it who know!