What's better, shut down or sleep?

Question

Should I shut my pc down every night or is sleep better. I am new to computers and was wondering what is best.

Answer 1

shutting down the computer sounds better

Answer 2

shut down cause when its on sleep the computer is still running so when you turn it back on from sleep it's gonna be really laggy

Answer 3

shut down is easier

Answer 4

Shut down.. it recharges your computer and is the green way. You could save $65 of an electricity bill per year by shutting off the computer. Sleep just wastes energy, plus when you re open it after its had more than one hour of 'sleep' its really slow and annoying

Answer 5

I think shutting the computer down is better.

Answer 6

I always shut down my computer every night before going to bed. If my computer remains idle for a certain period of time, it will automatically go to sleep.  

Answer 7

shut down. it saves you electricity. BE GREEN.

Answer 8

my laptop sleeps most of the time and I restart it every two - three days.

Done it for two years now with no problems...

Shut down saves energy

Answer 9

If you're going to eat or something that doesn't take up too much time [less than thirty minutes], then put it in sleep mode. If you're going to leave it for hours, shut it down.

Answer 10

For a PC shut down

For a Mac sleep

Somehow mac reacts completely ok as soon as you stop the sleeping mode, but I had not the same result in Pcs.

Answer 11

I think there is an argument for either.

It is generally considered better for the computer to leave it on continuously, rather than shutting down and restarting on a regular basis.

However, I find that an occasional restart can refresh the memory and speed things up.  Not to mention, you will save more power.

I would say leave it in sleep when you are working on projects, or maybe leave it on for a few days at a time, and then shut it down occasionally to let it rest.  

It's not scientific, but it has worked fine for me.

Answer 12

If you are done with your computer for a while, like over an hour, or don't need to keep anything running Then it be better to shut it down but if you are just going to be off for a few minutes or need to keep something running just put it to sleep. Vista should put itself to sleep after a while if you don't do anything on it.

     Basically if you are done for the night shut it down unless you have stuff that is set to run at night like antivirus or something.

Answer 13

Neither in my opinion. I feel that hibernate is the best function. Its kinda the in-between for sleep and shut down. Your session is saved with-in memory while your computer is turned off. On power-up, you just pick up from where you left off without the hassle of loading all those start-up programs again.

Answer 14

Shutdown is better as not only does it terminate power, it backs up crucial data that would otherwise just be sat in memory.

also (espically with laptops) shut down will give the computer time to cool down, meaning the system will run alot faster when loaded up next

and thats with out going into the complex memory issues

Answer 15

If you left your computer running in sleep mode all night, you would pay an extra 65$ a year for electric, but, would resume where you left off.

If you shut it down, you would not pay any more electrical costs, and its better for the computer

Bored? Check out this site!

You can get free stuff without a credit card, and without anything having to be shipped to your house!

You can custom order from amazon, or even ebay gift certificates

Sign up: http://www.rewards1.com/index.php?referr...

Answer 16

shutdown is better

Answer 17

There's three options - sleep, hibernate, and shutdown.

Sleep has the shortest startup but uses slightly more energy (the RAM is kept on.) Hibernate saves state to disk then powers off, while shutdown stops everything then powers off.

If you're not going to use your machine again soon then shutdown is best. Otherwise sleep or hibernate are fine.

The gory details in the link below.

Answer 18

shut down conserves your power, so that would be better.

but if you have a laptop, you can just put it to 'sleep', but just keep it charged and plugged in all night.

you should never let your computer/laptop run completely out of battery life and THEN charge it back up, that just ruins the battery life all together and it wont hold a charge as long.

hope that helps!

Answer 19

hibernate you can still be green! you will also save more money than if you put it on sleep! when you shut it down it takes way longer to start back up!