24/7 operation or dailly shut down?

Supposedly the stresses of turning the stuff on and off shortens life of components.

But really now, we're talking years and years anyway so it doesn't much matter.

I leave my computer on 24/7 and just let it sleep as necessary.

I don't think that leaving it on will appreciably shorten the life of the components. This fan I have sitting in front of me has an estimated lifetime of 50,000 hours. That's 5 years of 24/7 operation in normal people time. Unsure what other components are rated at, but you might expect something similar.

However, you are going to use less energy if you shut down...though if you really want to save energy, completely unplug it too, as most modern electronics still draw a little power while "turned off".

This question pops up here about every other month. And it goes back about 30 years to the birth of the IBM PC.

I have several desktop systems. I leave my workhorse system running 24/7 except for when I go on vacation. Been running fine for about 6 years. I also have a torrent box I leave running all the time. I turn on my gaming and multimedia system when I need to.

This is a gaming system in question, that is using a velociraptor hdd isn't that the component that is supposed to be stressed from turning on/off the most

Hard drives used to see wear & tear from stopping & starting, due to how the heads were parked. I believe that's no longer a huge issue.

Actually it's becoming more of one with green drives and whatnot starting to turn off on their own all the time. All in the name of saving pennies a year.

Right, but they park heads differently than they used to, from what I understand. There's still a risk, but it's not as bad as it used to be.

I turn of my PC when I'm not using it since I pay roughly $0.19 - $0.22 per KWH.

That makes a big difference. I am living and working in Saudi Arabia. My company pays my utility bills.  

I turn mine off because with an SSD boot up is so quick it's not a bother!  

Best answer selected by jijoslin.