On 12 Apr 98 at 11:09, Errol wrote:

> A friend of mine never switches his computer off.
>
> He says that the act of switching a computer on every day
> gives the machine a big "shock" and shortens the life of a
> computer.
>
> What do you folks think about this theory ?

  This argument has been done to death on the Internet over the last
decade.

  There are three basic cases:

1.  Servers.
  These often have to be up and running all the time.  Obviously,
leave them on.

2.  Home machines.
  These may go several days between one use and the next.  Turn them
off.

3.  Workstations.
  These tend to be heavily used for 8 hours, and then not at all for
16, but may go 64 hours without use over a weekend.  This is where
it's unclear whether the energy saved is worth the risk/effort.  A
good compromise is to power up Monday morning and power down Friday
evening, but some people power down every night, and some never.

David G