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iMac sleep question

Chumburro2U

Chumburro2U

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Sep 14, 2009
324
12
I Love L.A.
I recently learned that just putting your iMac to Sleep is better than shutting it down everyday. Well, I am a light sleeper and I can still hear the iMac every now and then at night making sounds like it is booting up. It doesn't make the screen come on, but it makes the same sound and it wakes me up. Is that the norm or is my only option to completely shut down the computer everyday to not hear it make the boot up sound?
 
Chumburro2U said:
I recently learned that just putting your iMac to Sleep is better than shutting it down everyday. Well, I am a light sleeper and I can still hear the iMac every now and then at night making sounds like it is booting up. It doesn't make the screen come on, but it makes the same sound and it wakes me up. Is that the norm or is my only option to completely shut down the computer everyday to not hear it make the boot up sound?
Click to expand...

Since Lion mine is doing the same.......... you aren't running lion by any chance?
 
Is this not just the Low Power Wake function of Lion?
I've got Lion too, and mine does the same every now and then.
 
Btw you know iMacs make this little fan kind sounding noise when in sleep mode right?

I dont know how to describe it but they do and cant be stopped unless shut downed.
 
Yes!!

yusukeaoki said:
Btw you know iMacs make this little fan kind sounding noise when in sleep mode right?

I dont know how to describe it but they do and cant be stopped unless shut downed.
Click to expand...

This is what I am talking about. That noise wakes me up all the time. So, whats the point of putting my iMac to "sleep" if it really doesn't sleep?
 
yusukeaoki said:
Sleep and shut down are different.
the computer still has to run in sleep mode.
Click to expand...

The only thing that is powered in sleep mode is the RAM, which is completely silent. You shouldn't be hearing any noise if your computer is actually sleeping. If you hear something, only the display is asleep.
 
alust2013 said:
The only thing that is powered in sleep mode is the RAM, which is completely silent. You shouldn't be hearing any noise if your computer is actually sleeping. If you hear something, only the display is asleep.
Click to expand...

iMac for some reason can be heard.
Its with all iMacs.
I dont know whats causing it but its def making noises.
Not much that its bothering me though.
 
Chumburro2U said:
I recently learned that just putting your iMac to Sleep is better than shutting it down everyday. Well, I am a light sleeper and I can still hear the iMac every now and then at night making sounds like it is booting up. It doesn't make the screen come on, but it makes the same sound and it wakes me up. Is that the norm or is my only option to completely shut down the computer everyday to not hear it make the boot up sound?
Click to expand...

You need to change your Power settings so Network requests cannot wake your iMac. Its a small tick. Then it will sleep like a baby all night long (and you as well) ;)

--- This means that Applications like Remote or other network Apps will also not be able to wake your iMac and you will first have to click your mouse ---
 
Last edited:
yusukeaoki said:
iMac for some reason can be heard.
Its with all iMacs.
I dont know whats causing it but its def making noises.
Not much that its bothering me though.
Click to expand...

The 27" I have at home is dead silent when asleep. I can tell when it's still awake, which happens occasionally if you just leave it alone for a while, but if I manually put it to sleep, it doesn't make any noise.
 
Chumburro2U said:
So, whats the point of putting my iMac to "sleep" if it really doesn't sleep?
Click to expand...
I think you misunderstand "sleep". It is meant to do far more then just provide an instant-on suspend. It is a very low power mode, but the iMac is actually still running. It is still listening to network traffic, actively managing Bluetooth and ready to run scheduled tasks.
That said there, may be some things that can be tweak to allow OS X to sleep more deeply. The first thing that I would try is disabling Wake on LAN.

BTW - There is nothing wrong with shutting down your iMac at night if that better meets your needs.
 
When the iMac 'sleep' sometimes it turns on by itself because it needs to do some processes like maintenace. I heard the same sound sometimes when I got the iMac with HD, but after I've bought 2011 iMac with SSD only I can't heard it if it turns on during the night, it make no sound, only when I'm very near I can hear the fans and psu but not from 1,5 meter from my bed.
 
aNodyNos said:
You need to change your Power settings so Network requests cannot wake your iMac. Its a small tick. Then it will sleep like a baby all night long (and you as well) ;)

--- This means that Applications like Remote or other network Apps will also not be able to wake your iMac and you will first have to click your mouse ---
Click to expand...

This works, it's a bit of a pain though.
 
Me Too

Mine makes the noise whenever the display sleeps. Its really annoying and I am running Lion as well. It makes the noise whether or not the I have the power settings to wake on network requests.

I can recreate it really easy since I have a hot corner to put my imac display to sleep. I am going to bring it in on my next Mac store trip!
 
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