I have a BitTorrent I'm downloading thats pretty big and going pretty slow. Do you think it'll be bad for my computer to leave it on (for days probably) while it downloads? Is there some way to let my eMac sleep while it continues to download?
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Can I leave my eMac on for a long time?
- Thread starter johnbro23
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The iMac I'm writing this to you with has been on for three years straight. So...yes, it's perfectly fine to leave it on for a few days.
I asked the same question to an Applecare tech a few weeks after my iMac Special Edition DV arrived. His answer was "do you turn your refrigerator off?"
For many applications, computers must be on constantly, and they are designed to handle it just fine.
I asked the same question to an Applecare tech a few weeks after my iMac Special Edition DV arrived. His answer was "do you turn your refrigerator off?"
For many applications, computers must be on constantly, and they are designed to handle it just fine.
really? your uptime is > 1000 days?SuperChuck said:
to original poster: no worries. leave it on. in fact, osx runs cleanup utilities on a daily, weekly and monthly basis, timed for sometime at night. so in that regard, it's better to leave it on. and you can fold!
Wow, that is so cool. I never thought your computer was like a refrigerator. Thats like shocking to me. I'll take your word for it though.
my mileage varied. to me, leaving it on is determined by uptime.Nermal said:I think rebooting is still considered as "leaving it on".
for example, from the machine that until recently was my webserver:
9:59PM up 157 days, 1:08, 2 users, load averages: 1.40, 1.36, 1.33
LOL... You guys are rough- tough crowd...lol.. In all seriousness though, I once had an uptime of 73 days... Not really sure why that's relevant to this topic, but hey, it is a feather in my Mac using cap...
To answer the original question, no worries leave your mac on- no need to shut down except for upgrades when prompted to...
To answer the original question, no worries leave your mac on- no need to shut down except for upgrades when prompted to...
but there are production machines which _do_ stay up for years. e.g. sun microsystems makes machines which can keep running through CPU swaps, RAM swaps, power supply swaps, etc...jemeinc said:
and i think OS updates and kernel mods, but i might be wrong there.
so i was going to be seriously impressed if a home user had a machine up for 3 years.
My eMac is on 24/7 I'm almost constantly ripping DVDs, downloading something on BitTorrent, Encoding video, and even folding. Anything that takes a long time to complete.
I suggest just turning the energy saver settings for your display to 1 minute and have your screen shut off when you're not using it. It'll both save your screen from burn-ins and save you on energy.
I suggest just turning the energy saver settings for your display to 1 minute and have your screen shut off when you're not using it. It'll both save your screen from burn-ins and save you on energy.
johnbro23 said:
More insightful than you might realize...i.e. the computer IS becoming an appliance.
The longest uptime I've ever heard of was at work, a sun ss/20 had an uptime of over 1500 days... problem was, no-one knew what it did, or wanted to take the risk of rebooting it. Ha ha ha...
It's better to reboot production machines periodically, just so you know you can do it, but I've kept Linux machines running for a year for sh*ts and giggles. A Mac running OS X should be able to easily match that if you didn't have to reboot after some simple patches. <sigh>
-Wyrm
johnbro23 said:
TURNING OFF AND ON YOUR COMPUTER REPEATEDLY IS BAD FOR IT!!! LEAVE IT ON ALL THE TIME!
Computer parts are designed to function at a constant state. It's switching between states that causes wear. By states I mean being used, being in standby, and being completely off. As far as power, just put the computer to sleep.
Do these clean up facilities work whilst my eMac is sleeping (it likes a good lie in, too!) , or should i also run the Mac Janitor program to make sure they get done?
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/9410
I love this little program. I set it as one of my startup apps.
It's also helpful for measuring boot time.
I love this little program. I set it as one of my startup apps.
It's also helpful for measuring boot time.
I do that on my iMac - I recommend setting Energy Saver as follows: computer sleeps - never, display sleeps - 3 minutes (or longer if you sit at the computer often without typing anything or moving the mouse for longer than 3 minutes), hard disk sleeps when possible - yes. It's up to you whether or not you use the screen saver - if you do use it, change the display sleep setting to something longer than your screen saver's activation time like Mac OS X suggests, unless you use the screensaver purely as a means of locking the computer, in which case it does not matter.zimv20 said:
Mac OS X is smart enough not to sleep the HD when something tries to read from or write to it - your video conversions/BT sessions would still run without problems.neoelectronaut said:
There's nothing wrong with the computer going to sleep. It saves lots of power.
Bittorrent, DVD Ripping, etc. will stop it from going to sleep until the task is done; therefore, that's not a reason.
The only other reason I can think of is the periodic scripts, and there's a solution to that too. Do a google search for "XJanitor.pl" - it's a perl script which checks the logs to see the last time each periodic script was run. If it's been over a day for the daily, a week for the weekly, or a month for the monthly, then it will run the necessary ones. Just add it to crontab to have it run automatically. I have it run at 15 and 45 past the hour (since my computer is a laptop and is frequently asleep). I've checked the logs and it works excellently!
edit: Hah! I have a computer that I only put to sleep manually (eMac) because it acts as a print server (and occasionally a file server). I forgot to include that reason, which is very valid.
Bittorrent, DVD Ripping, etc. will stop it from going to sleep until the task is done; therefore, that's not a reason.
The only other reason I can think of is the periodic scripts, and there's a solution to that too. Do a google search for "XJanitor.pl" - it's a perl script which checks the logs to see the last time each periodic script was run. If it's been over a day for the daily, a week for the weekly, or a month for the monthly, then it will run the necessary ones. Just add it to crontab to have it run automatically. I have it run at 15 and 45 past the hour (since my computer is a laptop and is frequently asleep). I've checked the logs and it works excellently!
edit: Hah! I have a computer that I only put to sleep manually (eMac) because it acts as a print server (and occasionally a file server). I forgot to include that reason, which is very valid.
Actually, it is much better for your computer to stay on most of the time. The most wear and tear placed on electronics is the intensive hard drive operations- ie. start up....similar to that of a car. Cars take the most abuse during start up. Idiling is the next hardest...minus high revving or something like that which would obviously be worse.