2 questions

[Imperatriz]

Recently, i noticed AVAST was freezing my PC when playing on-line games "specifically" Phantasy Star On-line. At first i thought a lot of other reasons, like videocard, spyware, lag, etc, but i also noticed always it happens, the AVAST icon was spinning like crazy. The freezing was so annoying that it starts with a few time freezing then it start to take longer and longer to get free until the point i have to reboot. I can't use crtl+alt+del either while it is frozen. I must be fast to close the program when it back to run ok for a while. Then, what I discovered? When i disable the web shield, the freezing stop to happens. So i just keep it paused and when i finish to play i just click to reactivate the web shield back. Odd, it started to happen about one month ago and i play this game for years never getting something related.

Another question unrelated to this first one is more a case of opinion. I usually turn on my PC at morning and turn off late of night, which takes about 20h/day turned on. Friends has told me that...
- PC's shouldn't be turned off (unless you're planning to leave your house for long times).
- PC's only break when you turn it off (actually in 4 years with my PC it really never broke in my face. Only when i try to turn it on and when it doesn't work i say: what!? it was working ok yesterday!!).
- PC's consumes more energy if turned on many times a day.

Also i noticed most of my friends in MSN list goes to sleep, leaving it logged on, so i supposed they don't turn their PC's off as well. So, just for looking to expert opinions, i would like to know opinions from here. Should i really let it turned on 24h? (my bedroom where it stays is ventilated, so no risks due to overheating).

[gdiloren]

Personnally, I find it more secure and economical to take it off, even with the ON-OFF button of the CPU unit at the back to make sure. You never know, lets say you have a dialer and it turns on your pc and since it's a dialer logs on to your internet provider. For your first question, see if you haven't done the same stupid thing than me yesterday, I uninstalled Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 redistributable thinking I had no use of it and not understanding how it landed there. Next thing I knew was my PrevX Console wouldn't start or open and neither AVG Anti-rootkit. So, it's not Avast, it's something else I think.

[Imperatriz]

I never uninstalled anything from microsoft, but Outlook Express that i never updated. I usually update my windows and i believe i've seen this program you're talking about. I didnt mess with it.

[neal62]

Imperatriz. No, I wouldn't leave your pc turned on for 24 hours or all the time. You have cooling fans inside of your pc. If you leave it on all of the time these fans draw Dust inside of the computer. If you don't clean out the inside of the pc at times this dust will coat the blades of the cooling fans which causes them to not cool like they should. If this happens you could have a component failure. As far as using extra electricity. No, the pc doesn't use that much in the way of electrical power. Also Most versions of Windows act strangely after the pc has been left turned on all of the time. When this happens you have to turn off the pc anyway for a few mins and then turn the pc back on for your pc to act normally. This is just MHO and I hope it helps answer your question. 

[CharleyO]

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I agree with Neal ... plus running the fans continuously will shorten their lifespan and therefore cause you troubles before they would otherwise be due.


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[Kilia]

I agree with Charley and Neal. I too had heard it was better to leave the pc on 24/7...but after consulting with my son who is an IT specialist, he told me that home pc's do better being shut off at night when one is sleeping. The only computers that are left on 24/7 are servers who give us forums and websites like these.

[FreewheelinFrank]

- PC's only break when you turn it off (actually in 4 years with my PC it really never broke in my face. Only when i try to turn it on and when it doesn't work i say: what!? it was working ok yesterday!!).

PC components are stressed the most when the computer is turned on- voltage spikes and temperature changes occur which can cause components nearing the end of their life to fail. This probably explains the above observation.

[bob3160]

Except for an occasional reboot, my system is on all the time.
If I shut it down, how would you get to MySharedFiles ? 

Frank has already mentioned the stress factor.
I usually blow out the tower once a week which eliminates the dust buildup.