vista hibernate, sleep question

Which is better for your pc, and if hibernation stores your current information to your hard drive does it erase it when you open it back up so that you hard drive does not get filled up by hibernating or how does that actually work?

Also on a laptop how often should you actually do a restart because I usually only do one per week since I use my laptop several times throughout the day.

 

Your assumption about sleep/hibernate is correct.

I usually do mine every few days. So the computer doesn't go insane on me

 

Hibernation only ever uses that amount of space. The next time you hibernate, it overwrites the old information.

However often you want. Ideally, the computer would not be consuming any power whenever you are not using it, but shutdowns and boots may be inconvenient.

 

Thanks, I am kinda new to vista and I have been reading up on it and it sounds like Vista's sleep option might just be the best of both worlds and I think I will just use it.


Also lets say I was traveling, would it be best to do a complete shut down?

 

I'm not sure how the Vista sleep option works (is it the same thing as Stand By in XP?).
When you're traveling you should either turn off the computer or put it on hibernate. In both cases the computer is powered off.

 

Sleep is a combination of Standby and Hibernate. When you ask the computer to "sleep," the computer enters standby, and then if you don't disturb the computer, it hibernates after 3 hours.

 

Well that's half right. The computer essentially makes a backup like it does when hibernates, which is why it takes a while to sleep.

 

Thanks all I think I will use sleep and just shut it down if I ever travel with it.