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Sleep or Shut Down PC ?

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shut sleep
2K views 22 replies 11 participants last post by  ronan 
#1 ·
My PC is running slow at the moment...starts up ok...but when i click on any shortcut,it takes a good 1 minute before i can access the web page.......this contrasts to beforehand when it took 1 second !! :cry:

I have to say though that once i can get the 1st page up and running,everything goes ok.

Now this only happens if i boot up the PC.

Strangely enough i've been experimenting with sleep mode.....and the problem never occurs with that.Is this a coincidence?
Is the boot procedure causing the problem and if so,why ?

Any ideas ? :confused:

Thanks

Ronan

NB Running Linux Mint 10 Julia btw...though i think this may be irrelevant.
 
#2 ·
when you first start-up a Op-Sys, it can take a bit of time, even after it appears to have loaded, for all of the background services to load up, this can cause a delay in loading up a program the first time you use it, and because the service's need'd to run the program are all ready running after you close the program, the second time you run it, it will load alot quicker....

Sleep mode leaves the op-sys loaded in memory, its not the same a reboot, sleep mode does not, in effect, have to reload the system.
 
#3 ·
As above, arguably rebooting it not necessary. I have one of my Linux servers up for 1160 days. The only issue now with modern OS's (this includes Windows which is far better than it used to be) is the crap applications running on them, especially any with memory leaks which end up ****ing it up for everything else.
My GF works from home, she uses a 5 year old laptop which we only reboot/power off at weekends. The rest of the time we just 'sleep' it.
 
#5 ·
No, (in laymans terms) hibernate, takes a copy of the active memory and stores it on the hard drive then fully powers off the machine. When you turn the computer back on the system detects the hibernation file is active and reloads the memory back into RAM.
 
#8 ·
Well,the sleep mode seems to be better than rebooting...still not as fast as previously...and that's with a good system cleanout with bleachbit..........but then it's a fairly old PC and i'm running an older version of Linux...just getting a bit senile like me :(.....when it really starts to bug me,i'll have to dig into my (padlocked) wallet and purchase......NOOOOOO !!! :cry:

NB Strange.....as i type this,no problems.....seems that the PC needs to "warm up" ie get a few minutes of usage,then kind of learns how to work...bloody technology !!!:rolleyes:
 
#9 ·
NB Strange.....as i type this,no problems.....seems that the PC needs to "warm up" ie get a few minutes of usage,then kind of learns how to work...bloody technology !!!:rolleyes:
In addition to the start up processes already described in the thread, Computers usually do something called caching. If you run a program for the first time it usually reads it from a slow hard disk. It can then copy that program into memory, either the computer's memory or the hard disk's memory (called the hard drive cache). On home PCs, system memory is usually many times faster than reading from the hard disk, even on solid state drives.

This can give you the impression that it is learning what you are doing when in fact it is just making things you have just used be available from somewhere faster than the hard drive the next time it is needed.

Buying extra memory doesn't make the PC's base speed go any higher which you would see at boot up, but it does give you the impression that it is running faster because it has more memory for things like caching.
 
#12 ·
Ronan, if I were you, after performing the maintenance you have done i'd look to check the SMART status of the hard disk, if the drive is failing then performance can be very poor.

If you don't have SMART tools already check your linux machines application update and installation tool to see if its available for installation.

Alternatively the BIOS of the machine may have a built in disk checker. Hard Drives are one of the only moving parts in a computer and do eventually wear out.

It doesn't sound like its the drive from your description, but it will cost nothing to check and its good experience.
 
#15 ·
Tried to download the smart tools from my internal software manager.....got lots of error messages....and no download.....pressed F2 on the PC during boot up...bios came up...checked hard drive...nothing seems to be wrong.....perhaps it's cos this Linux Mint 10 is old it's not being supported anymore.

Will just live with it...as i said ok when it's been warmed up for a few minutes....til it finally gives up the ghost !! :cry:
 
#16 ·
It entirely depends how you use your computer and the OS you are running.
With Sleep mode you are as others have said leaving stuff waiting to run in cached memory. That's fine if you don't push your machine too hard and have plenty of RAM and virtual memory available. If however the programs you run are memory hoggers then it often pays to do a full reboot to clear the memory cache and make them respond more quickly when you reload.

Against shutting down (in Windows anyway) is if you aren't looking properly and find yourself presented with XX updates that need to install and you need to leave quickly. (Always try to remember to Shut Down with Ctrl-Alt_Del and the power icon at bottom right to let you overirde the pesky updates when you need to.)

Must admit I am surprised that Mint should display the slow startup syndrome but then I suppose it has a full GUI to load and maintain. A non GUI Linux/Unix will always fly compared to anything with a GUI.
 
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