Turning Your Computer On And Off

To make this easy use a powerboard with multi outlets for printer, computer, monitor, modem, speakers, scanner and any other bits and pieces. A six port powerboard is the best, with a master switch on the powerboard preferred.

Turning on your computer is now simple. With it all connected together, turn on the wall switch or the powerboard switch and push the button on the front of the computer. Away she goes.

A computer monitor draws a lot of power when it starts up and then it settles down to a steady low level. As it powers up, the voltage may drop momentarily to a level which could cause the motherboard of the computer to malfunction. LCD monitors do not cause the same voltage drop. The problem is automatically avoided by turning on the powerboard and then pressing the push-button on the computer box.

Modern computers no longer have an old-fashioned power switch. They have instead, a power supply which is controlled through a circuit on the computer motherboard. The power push-button on the front of the computer box is connected to two pins on the motherboard – join the pins for a moment and the power is turned on. Providing you have a good quality motherboard, join them again with Windows XP running and an orderly shutdown will proceed, finally turning the power off. If the computer has a haemorrhage and will not shutdown, the usual setting for a forced turn-off is to hold the push-button in for 4 seconds, according to how the motherboard has been set. A forced turn-off is not to be done lightly!

You will realise that unless you switch the power off at the wall or the powerboard master switch, the motherboard is always alive, even when you perform a normal shutdown.

A normal shutdown occurs when you choose Start/Turn Off Computer/Turn Off. Usually after this you should turn off the power to the computer ie everything off. Now, once the Start/Turn Off Computer/Turn Off sequence has completed and the screen shows black, turning off the powerboard where it plugs into the wall or at its own master switch means everything is off. This is recommend as the general rule because it is totally safe; no danger of fire or power zaps to the computer. Strongly not recommended is leaving on the power after Start/Turn Off Computer/Turn Off, as the power supply in the computer remains on and the motherboard is on and ready to start-up - there is no safety in this option.

Various other standby options are available and are dependent on your needs. If it is your intention to save power and to save the hard drive from unnecessary work, then Start/Turn Off Computer/Standby should be used. This leaves the monitor on, which is the major power user, chewing up power. The turning off of some monitors with their inbuilt switch is not recommend because some monitor switches are flimsy, so some judgment is necessary - maybe if this is a problem the monitor could be plugged into a separate switch. Now, to come off Standby, turn on the monitor (if you turned it off) and then tap the space bar or wriggle the mouse.

If you are using a normal shutdown when you go for a walk for half an hour, this is more harmful to the longevity of the computer system than leaving it switched on while you are away. If you leave the monitor on it continues to use power. Every time a system is cycled on and off extra stress is placed on the components – more stress than just leaving it running for a short while.

All things considered, on in the morning when you first need to use the computer and off at bedtime is easy and OK. Standby when you are away for a while (with the monitor off if you like) is OK. A normal shutdown including turning off the power if you are going out for more than say half an hour is recommended.

Windows XP works best if all peripherals are switched on before you press the push-button and start the computer.