Leaving computer on for a week.

wildest_jjk

wildest_jjk

wildest_jjk

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6 Jun 2011
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Hey guys,

Normally I turn my PC off after every use. However I am going away for a week and need access for a variety of reasons.

I am mainly worried about the cost, overheating, effect on hardware etc. Would any of these things be a problem? Or would it make no difference?

Cheers :)
 
Leaving the pc will not course no major issues.

Belongs your cooling is up to scratch and perhaps put the high alarm temp limit on in the BIOS which should shut the pc down if a high temp is seen.

Power wise, remove any overclocks and enable speedster, if you have onboard GPU use this instead of a external high powered card.
 
if your PC can stay on for an hour and not overheat doing normal tasks, there is no reason it would not stay on indefinitely, assuming the room temperature remains within normal levels. None of the other things would be an issue either. Hardware is not going to wear out using it for one week. People leave hardware on for a lot longer than a week. Servers I deal with have uptimes sometimes of years.
In terms of cost...assume your PC idles at around 100watts (just a random guess - might be less, also easy for calculations being a round number) and assuming your electricity is charged at say 15p per KWH. This would cost about 36 pence per day to run (24 hours solid I took as a day). So 36 pence x 7 days solid = £2.52
 
Should be fine. Overheating won't be a problem. It won't be any hotter after a week than it will after a couple of hours; especially seeing as it's not likely to be doing anything too demanding (downloading videos, right?;))

Components are designed to run for ages. I'd had PC's which have been left on for 6 months at a time and only got turned off due to sofware problems.

Cost will be low. Like a couple of quid extra on your bill, if that.
 
Thanks for the response,

Do all motherboards have the high alarm temp limit?

What is speedster? How do I enable?

I have an ATI HD 6870, and a i5 2500k processor should I enable the CPU graphics?

Cheers :)
 
If it cant run 24/7 without overheating, it's broken.

It isn't especially unusual to leave a computer on continually, & the folding@home people run it at 100% load for months at a time.

Advice may not apply to laptops.

Edit: way too slow, stupid phone :(
 
Thanks for the responses, so it pretty much sounds like there isn't much to worry about?

I will only be using it to run a camera and using it as a proxy server.

Cheers :)
 
wildest_jjk said:
Thanks for the response,

Do all motherboards have the high alarm temp limit?

What is speedster? How do I enable?

I have an ATI HD 6870, and a i5 2500k processor should I enable the CPU graphics?

Cheers :)
Click to expand...

Sorry speedstep - auto correct :( (with cpu-z open does the multiplier change)

What motherboard are you using?
 
wildest_jjk said:
Thanks again for the response.

My motherboard MSI P67A-GD65.

What is speedstep?

Cheers :)
Click to expand...

Your board does not support the onboard GPU, So you will need to keep the main GPU in.

Speedstep reduces the cpus multiplier when idle and increases this when the cpu is stressed, this reduces the current draw of the system and will keep the cpu slightly cooler. Running CPU-Z will show if this in operation.
 
Speedstep is automatic underclocking. When your pc isn't doing much it clocks down the processor to save power.

You access it via the bios. It's normally on by default, so unless you disabled it you don't have to do anything.
 
Thanks for the responses.

The multiplier does not seem to change, is it the x16.0 value?

3.jpg


Also how do I enable the auto power off feature if the computer reaches a certain temperature?

Thanks :)
 
wildest_jjk said:
Thanks for the responses.

The multiplier does not seem to change, is it the x16.0 value?

3.jpg


Also how do I enable the auto power off feature if the computer reaches a certain temperature?

Thanks :)
Click to expand...
its in speed step mode already as your cpu is running at only 1600 mhz
put it underload and it will go up

also if anything its better to keep your pc on then to turn it off :P
 
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Thats it :)

I will need to download your manual to find out where the function is, you might be better to have a look yourself, it usually will be where you adjust the fan speeds and the BIOS shows cpu temps.
 
Man that's worried me now! Thanks for looking though I really appreciate it.

These are the closest settings I could find would it be any of these:

e337a075.jpg


973fb3e4.jpg
 
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On my Gigabyte board it shows as cpu shutdown temperature.

I woud not really worry as the cpu will automatically throttle if the temp gets to high. (around 90c~)
 
Not to worry I guess then but thanks :) One other thing I wanted to ask here was about my PC fans and temps.

The other day I lowered them in the BIOS as they were pretty loud. But being that I am leaving it for 7 days I am not sure whether it would be better to turn them up again?

These are my current temps:

4.jpg


And here are my BIOS fan settings:

852e9a4c.jpg


Any help appreciated, thanks everyone :)
 
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