boyland@sequoia.Berkeley.EDU (John B. Boyland) (02/23/91)
The Sparc manuals say that the monitor should be turned on before the system unit is turned on and turned off after the system unit is turned off. In the interests of saving energy, we would like to turn off the monitors when the machines are unused overnight. Does anyone know why this shouldn't be done? Is there any official Sun position? [[Ed's Note: Turning off your system monitor has no effect on the actual CPU (unless it's a VT100 hooked up as a console :) :)); however, turning it on and off will probably reduce the lifetime of your monitors. It seems like this was discussed once in Sunspots, but I can't find the issues :(. -bdg]] John Boyland boyland@sequoia.Berkeley.EDU
adam@ste.dyn.bae.co.uk (03/16/91)
In article <1741@brchh104.bnr.ca> boyland@sequoia.Berkeley.EDU (John B. Boyland) writes: >The Sparc manuals say that the monitor should be turned on before the >system unit is turned on and turned off after the system unit is turned >off. Turning any electrical equipment (eg monitors) on or off causes electrical spikes, which can harm the delicate innards of other electrical equipment (eg SPARCstations). To cut your losses, you should turn things on cheapest -> expensivest, and off expensivest -> cheapest. Using a power drill from the same socket as your SPARC is not a good idea either :) That said, we turn the monitors off overnight with no ill effects, but I guess if we broke anything, Sun would just point at the manuals and laugh. Adam
jcs@cbnewsb.cb.att.com (John "C". Sucilla) (03/16/91)
>[[Ed's Note: Turning off your system monitor has no effect on the actual >CPU (unless it's a VT100 hooked up as a console :) :)); however, turning >it on and off will probably reduce the lifetime of your monitors. It seems >like this was discussed once in Sunspots, but I can't find the issues :(. >-bdg]] I'm interested in the cost differential between leaving the monitors on after hours vs. power clearing them when you go home. Obviously the electric bill will be lower when they are powered down every night but is that cheaper in the long run than having to pay the cost of repairs (or replacement) of monitors that die from frequent power cycling? has anyone done any research on this? Are there any published papers that can be snarfed? Hopefully, the research would include fire hazard data for monitors that are allowed to be powered up all night with nobody around to see them catch on fire. I mean, how often does that *really* happen? I've known of two that went up in smoke and flames in the last 14 years or so but I've heard of a couple more. AT&T Bell Laboratories, Naperville Il. JC Sucilla IX Room 1F-210, (708) 979-0599 jcs@ixstar.att.com
eggert@uunet.uu.net (Paul Eggert) (03/23/91)
jcs@cbnewsb.cb.att.com (John "C". Sucilla) writes: >Hopefully, the research would include fire hazard data for monitors that >are allowed to be powered up all night with nobody around to see them >catch on fire. I mean, how often does that *really* happen? Hard data on hazards would be wonderful; perhaps someone from Sun could comment? Failing that, here's some anecdotal evidence. I've been near Sun monitors for about a hundred powered-on monitor-years and have seen one go up in flames personally. It was a monochrome Sun-2 monitor. We try to turn our monitors off at night, except for SLCs, which have only one power switch for both monitor and CPU.