Computer Question (OT)

[Sandman]

Inigo Montoya,

Sounds like a compelling arguement. I do wish there were a way I could easily remove my new HD after I do the Ghost Image. I am still investigating how I can do this in my BIOS, but have not figured it out yet.

Thanks for your ideas.

jim

wrote:

Mine stays on 24x7 unless I'm leaving on travel for an extended
period (more than a day or two).

I use Powerquest's Drive Image which is similar to Ghost, and I
back up to a couple spare hard drives I mounted in removable bays.

The removable part I feel very strongly about. Should a virus
attack that deletes files, it does no good to have a cloned backup,
or RAID copy on another drive as the virus will delete/damage those
files as well. The same thing goes for an electrical zapping or
system overheating situation.

I make image backups to the removables and alternate which one is
sitting safely on the shelf. I also regularly back up my images to
CDs.

The next thing I really need to get into the habit of is keeping a
fairly recent set of backup CDs, especially those irreplacable
images, in my safe deposit box.

For what it is worth, I turn mine off when I am away for more than
an hour or so. I have a great system, very stable, very reliable,
very fast: Dell Pentium 3, 1.2 GZ, 512 RAM, 40 gig HD, CDRW, DVD,
etc running WinME.

My last computer (now my wife's) is a Compaq Presario running
Win98SE. I had a problem with it from time to time and everytime I
called customer support, they always wanted me to disable all of
those powersaving routines and disable screensavers. Ever since
that time, I became accustomed to turning on the computer when I'm
using it and turning it off when I'm not. Both machines boot
fairly fast, so it is no big deal to wait a minute or two for it to
boot.

Another thing I do is a fresh boot before and a reboot after new
software installation. And I love Norton Utilities.

Finally, my newest insurance policy is a second 40 GB hard drive
that I installed last week. I made an exact copy of my original
harddrive. I checked to make sure I can boot off of this new
harddrive and I can by going into the system bios. Now, if either
HD crashes or becomes corrupted, I can have my system back to a
point in time. I just bought Norton Ghost, and, in the next few
days I am going to take a Ghost image of my original HD and "image"
it to my new HD. I plan to do this every month, and my new HD can
hold about 3 of these "images". So, if I develop a problem, I can
go back one, two, or three months in time, restoring my system to
that exact state.

jim

wrote:

This may sound dumb, but I have to ask. I have been leaving my
computer on since I got it a couple years ago. At night when I go
to bed I just leave it on. Is this harmful at all? Does it matter
if you turn it off or not? Does anyone else do this?

--
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[Sandman]

poster,

Thanks for the suggestion. I have been tempted to upgrade the OS, but, I have not had one single problem with this present configuration. I do know that eventually, in spite of my best efforts, Operating System Decay will errode my system to a state of total chaos. My plan is to upgrade the OS when I have to reinstall the system.

I know this may not be relevant, but I jumped on the upgrade bandwagon years ago with the release of Win95. It was a nightmare! With another computer, I repeated the same mistake upgrading Win95 to Win98. Another mistake! So I have been burned a number of times. I know this time it is different, but it is still like sticking my finger in the light socket...I've been shocked before!

Thanks again for the suggestions,

jim

wrote:

Dwight1973,

I have a great system, very stable, very reliable, very fast: Dell Pentium 3, 1.2 GZ, 512 RAM, 40 gig HD, CDRW, DVD, etc running WinME.

What a waste! Great computer running a lousy operating system.
Dell should know better than put ME on these PIII and IVs ... just
a money ripoff ... and in many ways defeats the whole system.
Suggest you upgrade to Win2000Pro or WIN XP ... IMMEDIATELY ... and
find out what "very stable, very reliable, very fast" is really all
about! Cheers ...

--galleries at: http://www.pbase.com/sandman3

 

[Forrest41926]

Our electrical supplier has a calculator on its web site to check
the cost of some appliances. For a computer that is in use about
3-4 hours a day and then in sleep mode the rest of the time, it
cost just pennies a day. Not really worth the time to turn off...

Actually, the Wall Street Journal told all of it's emloyees to turn their computers and monitors off at night, to save energy ... but then they did a cost/benefit analysis and decided the five minutes of productivity that gets lost every morning when people boot up and log on to their networks wasn't worth the energy savings.

Personally, I put my laptop to sleep when I don't need it, and wake it back up ( in seconds ) when I do.

 

[poster]

Sandman ...

The reference to WIN95, 98, ME are irrelevent to Win 2000 and XP. Win 2000 and XP are from a totally different technology background ... 95, 98, and ME all being developed with "compatibility" being the most important consideration. Win 2000/XP are from the NT line where security and reliability are the primary consideration ... which is why they are so stable. The problem with waiting is always the some ... you end up with so many applications with so many upgrades that it is a nightmare to install them all again ... not to speak of all the drivers you will upgrade in the interim. I still advise ... bite the bullet and upgrade now. I think you will not regret it! Cheers ...

 

[Forrest41926]

commented on the need to do a warm re-boot or cold re-boot from
time to time as programs get added, changed or deleted.

I'm running Windows 2000 on a laptop. I put it to sleep and wake it up when I need it. It takes a second or two to wake up, and when it does, everything I was running ( Photoshop, Access, FrontPage ) is still running with my files open. Very convenient. I only "boot" my computer every few weeks, on the theory that it probably still helps. But it's very rare that I run into any trouble. Of course, I already have all the software I need for a while on my computer...

 

[poster]

Another reason to have 2000 pro or XP ... they don't leak memory ... a constant Win95, 98, ME problem.

 

[Gene Miller77510]

I have always shutdown my computer. I have never used the maintenance wizard. I have always used msconfig. I mainly use cleanup, defrag and checked for updated drivers and updates from Microsoft, I also run Norton and Norton's Win Doctor. Now what is maintenance wizard used for? Is that just for scheduling things like cleanup and defrag? BTW I am now using XP which I like.

This applies to Win 98 and Win Me systems.These are the systems
with the maintenance wizard.

 

[Inigo Montoya]

Yeah, you could probably just disable the drive in the BIOS after you've made the ghost image. The problem is, Windows is kind of funny about the way drive letters get assigned to different partitions, CD drives, etc. Some of them might "move around" on you depending on whether the GHOST drive is visible to the system or not.

Note that my "removable" drive bay is not hot swappable. I have to shutdown and power off to make the change.

Sounds like a compelling arguement. I do wish there were a way I
could easily remove my new HD after I do the Ghost Image. I am
still investigating how I can do this in my BIOS, but have not
figured it out yet.

Thanks for your ideas.

jim

wrote:

Mine stays on 24x7 unless I'm leaving on travel for an extended
period (more than a day or two).

I use Powerquest's Drive Image which is similar to Ghost, and I
back up to a couple spare hard drives I mounted in removable bays.

The removable part I feel very strongly about. Should a virus
attack that deletes files, it does no good to have a cloned backup,
or RAID copy on another drive as the virus will delete/damage those
files as well. The same thing goes for an electrical zapping or
system overheating situation.

I make image backups to the removables and alternate which one is
sitting safely on the shelf. I also regularly back up my images to
CDs.

The next thing I really need to get into the habit of is keeping a
fairly recent set of backup CDs, especially those irreplacable
images, in my safe deposit box.

 

[Inigo Montoya]

Well if you REALLY want to talk about a REAL operating system, REALLY stable, REALLY fast.....

Linux

Dwight1973,

I have a great system, very stable, very reliable, very fast: Dell Pentium 3, 1.2 GZ, 512 RAM, 40 gig HD, CDRW, DVD, etc running WinME.

What a waste! Great computer running a lousy operating system.
Dell should know better than put ME on these PIII and IVs ... just
a money ripoff ... and in many ways defeats the whole system.
Suggest you upgrade to Win2000Pro or WIN XP ... IMMEDIATELY ... and
find out what "very stable, very reliable, very fast" is really all
about! Cheers ...

 

[Inigo Montoya]

If you suddenly find that none of your "legacy" hardware and software works anymore. Took me a long time to get my scanner running ok under Win2k. This box started life running Windows 95 on a Dell Pentium Pro 200. The monitor and the floppy drive are all that's left running here of that system... tho I eventually had enough original parts to "rebuild" it for my kids. I've upgraded Win95 to Win95 OSR2 to Win98 to Win98SE to Win2K. Not a single wipe clean and start over along the way. A lot of coaxing and tweaking to make it happen, but it made it.

The beauty of a Ghost or Drive Image is that you can snapshot your main windows drive just before any upgrade attempts. If they fail miserably, you can restore and try again from the same starting point.

It's also handy to set the system up to dual boot so the old OS is still available if need be.

Sandman ...

The reference to WIN95, 98, ME are irrelevent to Win 2000 and XP.
Win 2000 and XP are from a totally different technology background
... 95, 98, and ME all being developed with "compatibility" being
the most important consideration. Win 2000/XP are from the NT line
where security and reliability are the primary consideration ...
which is why they are so stable. The problem with waiting is
always the some ... you end up with so many applications with so
many upgrades that it is a nightmare to install them all again ...
not to speak of all the drivers you will upgrade in the interim. I
still advise ... bite the bullet and upgrade now. I think you will
not regret it! Cheers ...

 

[Gr8full]

and run all three programs (disk defrag,disk cleanup,and scandisk) so you don't have to remember to.Personally I like to run them manually because I never know if I'll be on the computer for a few minutes or hours and I don't want it starting up on it's own.One other thing I do is to go into safe mode and then to device manager and remove duplicate drivers.Windows has a habit of installing multple drivers and you can only see them in safe mode.In normal mode it just shows one driver for each item.I don't know if this applies to XP or not though.One thing I like about Millenium and XP is that if you install something and mess up the system you can restore your system to a previous date (good copy of the registry) and you can go back quite a ways.In Win98 you can only go back five dates so you have to do it almost right after you detect a problem.For those with Win98 you do this by going to a command prompt and typing "scanreg restore" without the quotes.You will get a list of the five dates you can restore to.This is a valuable tool if you have a bad installation that screws up your system.

 

[Gene Miller77510]

Thanks for the input. I didn't realize that in the safe mode you can identify more then one driver. Drivers have always been some of the biggest problems people have with their computers. I don't know how XP would handle it. One day I will try.

and run all three programs (disk defrag,disk cleanup,and scandisk)
so you don't have to remember to.Personally I like to run them
manually because I never know if I'll be on the computer for a few
minutes or hours and I don't want it starting up on it's own.One
other thing I do is to go into safe mode and then to device manager
and remove duplicate drivers.Windows has a habit of installing
multple drivers and you can only see them in safe mode.In normal
mode it just shows one driver for each item.I don't know if this
applies to XP or not though.One thing I like about Millenium and XP
is that if you install something and mess up the system you can
restore your system to a previous date (good copy of the registry)
and you can go back quite a ways.In Win98 you can only go back five
dates so you have to do it almost right after you detect a
problem.For those with Win98 you do this by going to a command
prompt and typing "scanreg restore" without the quotes.You will
get a list of the five dates you can restore to.This is a valuable
tool if you have a bad installation that screws up your system.

 

[Gargoile]

This may sound dumb, but I have to ask. I have been leaving my
computer on since I got it a couple years ago. At night when I go
to bed I just leave it on. Is this harmful at all? Does it matter
if you turn it off or not? Does anyone else do this?

This has always been a question for some people. And ther are two answers.
Yes & No. Why

Some say that by turning on and off your system weakens the electrical joints on system boards. Due to the cooling and then heating and then cooling again. Connectors expand and contract causing a breakdown of the metal.

By always leaving your system on is fine. The problem comes when you power it off after say running for a year or so.. The system doens't start. As in the case of DASD (Mainframe hard drives) and PC HDA's ( Hard Drive Assembly) Once they are spun up and running they are fine. But its when the motor stops and has a problem spinning up the disks after sitting. If you turn ever turned on your PC and the HDA is stuck. So you hit the side of your PC and then you hear the HDA spin up and your OS loads.

So leaving it on or off is not a problem. I always leave mine running, just make sure you have a good UPS system. Not so much for power spikes.. Its the lack of power that does the most damage to systems.

Gargoile--Its better to have and not need it, than to need it and not have it. http://www.pbase.com/gargoileOly C2100UZ + C-180 + B-300Casio Wrist Camera

 

[Barry78908]

You all are probably computer genious's and know what's best, but I am one who powers off every night. Common sense tells me there is only so much useful running life in a pc and I don't want to spend most of mine while I'm sleeping. I've had three pc's at home since about '92 and have not had any problems. If it's so hard on them to turn them on and off everyday, one would think I would have had some problems with one of these guys. Two of these three computers are still in use. The first one, a Packard Bell, worked fine at home for about three years, then was used as a work station at my office for another three years before its hard drive finally conked out. It was, of course, pretty badly out of date by then anyway.

 

[Gene Miller77510]

I agree with shutting down the PC, but the monitor has a longer life if you let it go into the power saving mode so it has low current running through it and will not face a cold start. Before I retired, at our company, the monitors were left on and went into power saving mode when the PC's were shutdown.

You all are probably computer genious's and know what's best, but I
am one who powers off every night. Common sense tells me there is
only so much useful running life in a pc and I don't want to spend
most of mine while I'm sleeping. I've had three pc's at home since
about '92 and have not had any problems. If it's so hard on them
to turn them on and off everyday, one would think I would have had
some problems with one of these guys. Two of these three computers
are still in use. The first one, a Packard Bell, worked fine at
home for about three years, then was used as a work station at my
office for another three years before its hard drive finally conked
out. It was, of course, pretty badly out of date by then anyway.

 

[jkirk@oz]

Well looks like Im going aginst the trend here but I vote ALWAYS OFF (unless its needed as a Server etc). Reasons -

1/ The start/stop cold/hot issue is extremely minor, I can count on 1 hand the number of "genuine" faults I've encountered over many 100's of services / updates I've carried out. Most (electrical) have been damaged from "spikes" and "brown-outs", MOST when the owner was away !!

2/ In australia there is a HUGE number of house fires caused by failed computer components (again while owners were away), to the point there's been many RECALLS. (A good friend is the chief Electrical Inspector)

3/ Starting "COLD" gives you the opportunity to catch any MB / Equipment issues that may have started to sneak in. I've picked dozens this way, mainly on office computers that are left on. The owners mostly say "gee, it's never given any problems" .... yeah but 1 day it'd been too late.

Best case was a good friend complained his office computer was slowing down rapidly (no backups for 6 months !!!). I immediately told him to stop what he was doing and turn it off !! When I booted on a Floppy, it had literally 5 free bytes left on the HDD !!! It was saved.

4/ MTBF may not be an issue left ON either but the safety Issue to me is definitely the deciding factor.

JKirk

Dwight1973 wrote:
This may sound dumb, but I have to ask. I have been leaving my
computer on since I got it a couple years ago. At night when I go
to bed I just leave it on. Is this harmful at all? Does it matter
if you turn it off or not? Does anyone else do this?

 

[Maxven]

Hi Juli.

I didn't read the whole thread so pardon me if i repeat what's already been said. You can leave a desktop computer on most of the time with no problems other than an increased electrical bill and wear and tear. There'll be a slight performance drop if the computer isn't rebooted from time to time. Another performance gain comes from defragmenting the hard drive regularly.

Laptops don't have a large case and cooling system. They can be left on for quite a while since they power down to suspend mode themselves. Still it's better to give them a cooldown period once in a while. Laptops don't take long to boot so if I know I won't be using mine for most of a day I'll shut it down completely. At the very least you should turn your laptop off once a week and let it cool down completely, say for an hour. All electronic equipment have shortened life spans when constantly heated. Now a days our equipment is probably obsolete before something breaks but I still prefer to treat my electronics carefully. If you decide to leave your laptop off for a long period of time you should check your manual. Depending on the battery certain precautions should be taken.

Maxven

Most of these answers have been on desktop computers. What do you
do with laptops?
--
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21oo, B-3oo
3o4o
Juli

 

[L-5]

This may sound dumb, but I have to ask. I have been leaving my
computer on since I got it a couple years ago. At night when I go
to bed I just leave it on. Is this harmful at all? Does it matter
if you turn it off or not? Does anyone else do this?

Beleave it or not, that is what they were designed for.If a person is not connected to the internet, there is no real need though.But obviously this
is not your case.--jazzman

 

[Forrest41926]

I put mine in standby mode ( or let it put itself to sleep ) for the very fast wake up times, and having my apps/docs still going when I do bring it up. With 2000, it's been very stable, and I don't have to boot more than every few weeks. It's pretty much like being turned off, except the RAM is still drawing some power.

I didn't read the whole thread so pardon me if i repeat what's
already been said. You can leave a desktop computer on most of the
time with no problems other than an increased electrical bill and
wear and tear. There'll be a slight performance drop if the
computer isn't rebooted from time to time. Another performance gain
comes from defragmenting the hard drive regularly.

Laptops don't have a large case and cooling system. They can be
left on for quite a while since they power down to suspend mode
themselves. Still it's better to give them a cooldown period once
in a while. Laptops don't take long to boot so if I know I won't be
using mine for most of a day I'll shut it down completely. At the
very least you should turn your laptop off once a week and let it
cool down completely, say for an hour. All electronic equipment
have shortened life spans when constantly heated. Now a days our
equipment is probably obsolete before something breaks but I still
prefer to treat my electronics carefully. If you decide to leave
your laptop off for a long period of time you should check your
manual. Depending on the battery certain precautions should be
taken.

Maxven

Most of these answers have been on desktop computers. What do you
do with laptops?
--
http://www.pbase.com/julivalley/galleries
21oo, B-3oo
3o4o
Juli

 

[Terry Thorn]

If you only do a warm boot (restart) the memory does not have a
chance to empty out.The only way for memory to clear itself is to
do a cold boot.(shut down and restart) Memory needs the power cut
off for about ten seconds to fully empty.Your system could start to
slow down or lock up if this is not done once in a while.The other
thing to prevent system slow down or lockups is to do routine
maintenance on your system.Defrag,disk cleanup,and scandisk should
be run every month or two.They can be found by going to
Start-Programs-Accessories-System Tools.You can also find the
"maintenance Wizard" there which will run all three and can also be
scheduled to run when you want.The best way to run these is in safe
mode so there are no programs running in the background that can
cause it to continually start over.To get to safe mode you need to
get to the startup menu.You can do this by tapping your F8 key on
startup.If you cannot do it this way then you can go to Start-Run
and type in msconfig and click ok.When the system configuration
utility comes up click on the advanced button and put a check in
the "enable startup menu" box.Just remember to go back and take it
out afterwards or you will get the startup menu on every
boot.Another thing you can do when you have the "system
configuration utility" window up is to click on the startup tab.In
here you will find every program that starts and runs in the
background when you turn on your system.A lot of these do not need
to run all the time as you can easily start them manually.If you
remove a check you are not removing the program,only stopping it
from running all the time and slowing down your system.
Woops,looks like I got on a bit of a roll.lol I'll stop now.

Lots of good basic information there. I guess that's why I have so few problems with my system. I always turn my system off when not in use, I only run the programs that are an absolute necessity, and I regularly scan and defrag.