Is it ok?

Is it ok that you have your notebook left on for 24 hours then once in a while or when ever you need to reboot the system to refresh the system?

 

Apart from increasing your electric bill, it's fine.

 

Define "leaving it on for 24 hours." Do you mean having it on all the time every day? Do you put it in sleep mode when you're not using it?

Either way, it should be fine with any modern computer.

 

I put mine into hibernate instead of shutting it down all of the time. And it gets a good 12 hours of use every day.

 

I personally want to keep my components alive as long as possible. I shutdown most of my computers during the night because the G84/G86 defects really scared me. Plus why run additional heat if you aren't doing anything?

Course if my gaming rig is running torrents then I'll leave it be.

 

Can't imagine why anyone would leave a notebook on for 24 hours since it is a portable device? Nevertheless, I've never heard of any deleterious effects coming about due to that choice.

However there has been evidence that indicates issues when desktops are left on continuously. Still, these only comes up from extended period lasting a mouth or longer.

The last I read about this, suggested computers need to be turned off and restarted every once in a while for stable operation.

I agree with this. I usually boot/shut down only once a day.

 

I left my MacBook on stand-by (sleep mode) for 4 days while I was on vacation and when I came back, the hard drive was fried. I'm pretty sure that was just a coincidence, but either way, it's scared me out of leaving the computer on sleep mode for that long again.

 

Fried? Like seized, gone, kaput?

Was the notebook plugged in (maybe it got zapped?) or did it simply run out of juice and corrupted the OS/x installation?

 

It was gone, yeah. Computer wouldn't start up and then I took it to the Apple store and they told me the HDD was gone. I had to have it replaced.

It wasn't plugged in, but the white light was blinking, so the battery still had power. I have no idea why it happened.

 

I remember when I had my old dell inspiron laptop with pentium III(code name copper mine I think) about 9 years ago, I often left it on 24/7 for over 1 month, without shutting it down. It stayed rock solid and never gave me any problems or signs of failing, ahh, back in those days, computers especially laptops had way better quality control compared to today's electronics, although they were ridiculously more expensive than today's laptops.

As for OP's question, it's ok to leave it on for 24 hours, provided your laptop doesn't overheat.

 

I see absolutely no harmful side-effects to leaving a laptop on 24/7.

Any part or component of your laptop that would fail due to overuse / overheating will die anyway during normal use. Letting your computer idle for the hours of the day that you are not using it will not really change anything.

 

Forcing a computer to burn electricity and produce heat for no apparent reason makes no sense to me. And your electric bill will be slightly higher.

 

You are correct that running a machine 24/7 is an inefficient use of resources.

But there is no harm in doing it, besides wasted resources. A computer is not like a candle, which will burn out faster the more you use it.

 

The ironic thing is, shutting down probably would have been more likely to trigger the G84/G86 defects than leaving it on permanently. The defects involved the joints cracking from repeated heating and cooling; which means that leaving the machine on would result in fewer heating/cooling cycles and thus less chance of cracking the solder joint. This is, by the way, why the "baking" method works; the heat from baking reflows the solder and repairs the joint... at least temporarily.

 

@OP: See here, and search the forum next time.

Kind of my line of thinking. I put my computer into standby when I leave my computer doing nothing for >30 minutes, and shutdown at the end of every day. Occasionally, I hibernate if I am working on a project with a ton of stuff open.

 

Well I understand if you are doing something but if you are doing NOTHING why leave it on? The way I see it;

I want to keep my components lasting as long as possible. Most vulnerable to me? Hard drives, CPU, motherboard, GPU.

Hard drives have moving parts. ANYTHING with moving parts is bound to fail, even with proper maintenance (that is why you change the oil in your car, do proper maintenance). Unfortunately there is no way to properly maintain your hard drive really (in terms of opening it up and trying to replace parts). Thus by having the hard drive less active, the hard drive will last longer.

For CPU/GPU/motherboard by leaving your system off it will reduce the amount of heat over time, thus having your core components last longer. The #1 reason of motherboard "failure" is MOSFETs go bad. Leaving it on all the time will shorten the life of them and cause earlier failure. Now you can get a cooling pad but turning off your notebook will be even better. Plus it's *gasp* free!

 

Because modern notebook can be used as desktop replacement and I left my work notebook on 24/7. I can RDP into it and that means I can have my work done no matter when I am. In addition, there are scheduled task that needs to be done(backup etc.)

And an idle notebook's power consumption is not that high(the screen is shutdown and the GPU is in idle state as well). My measure seems to be that it is around 10-15W.

As for required regular reboot, I don't know where that idea comes from. Since the day of NT 3.51, my average length between reboot is 30-60 days and the longest was around 180 days or so. Never had stability problem with that. It gets shorter and shorter now, not because of stability but the frequent Windows Update that was introduced since XP.

 

The main cause for Mosfet failure is from ESD and dirty power, not from leaving it on all the time. I look at my laptop schematic as an example and there no real protection from ESD events. I have equipment out in the field that is high powered using Mosfets exactly as they are in laptops and never had a failure. The reason? I put Transient Voltage Suppressors right at the input jack of the DC supply. Now if the laptop manufactures would spend an extra $.30 the Mosfets would last a lot longer. Just a FYI.

 

I have my drives set to turn off after a certain period of inactivity. You should too.

Mosfet failure the leading cause of motherboard failure? That's a new one. The only time I have ever killed one was by shorting it out or ESD. ESD gives it a quiet death, but a short makes it go "snap, crackle, POP!" I suggest you really look into Folding@Home and other distributed computing projects. Many thousands of people run many more thousands of computers at full load on the CPU and GPU 24/7 with no ill effects. The lifespan of most computer parts other than hard drives is mostly irrelevant since it is far past the end of their useful life. Really the parts of a computer most vulnerable to usage are the hard drives, fans, and capacitors. Correct drive management takes care of the first, but there is nothing you can do about dud fans and capacitors except replace them when they go bad. Fans are a piece of cake, but they are very rare to fail unless they are of the bottom of the barrel bargain bin variety. Capacitors are a lot more hit or miss and very unpredictable, but the chances of getting bad caps that will need replacing at some point in the hardware's life is pretty low, and has been continuously getting better.

 

I think the board manufacturers may have learned their lesson on the capacitor thing. They were not properly derating the voltage, temperature and ripple currents. They were cutting it to close and using cheaply manufactured parts.

 

Oh well half my systems have solid state drives now, and I will probably put an SSD into all my computers in the future.

Most "common" motherboard failures is bad MOSFET(s). People chuck away motherboards or get them replaced but most just need basic board level repair, at least that's my experience. Now that's not counting liquid damaged units, or dropped units, or the defective nVidia chips, but unit where people attempt to power on their notebooks after shutting it down the previous night. In fact most manufacturers with SR's take "bad" motherboards, and go out and usually do board level repair and sell them as refurbished.

As for capacitors, if you aren't using Japanese made capacitors that's GG for you lol. Chinese made ones tend to explode!