Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

Amen. The best thing about LCDs is they don't hog up all your desktop real estate...

Exactly why I switched. - Desk space.
The CRTs went to Goodwill as freebie LCDs came in and got fixed.
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CRT TVs got rotated out the same way.
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[weirdlookinguy]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

I can't really say whether I prefer CRT or LCD.

I used to be on the CRT monitor bandwagon until my 19" Trinitron died almost 4 years ago and I (begrudgingly, because I was still a CRT guy) got a 19" LG LCD. Hooked it up with DVI and was blown away. Crisp edge to edge, good colors, nice and bright display. CRTs may have better colors but I think a decent LCD looks pretty damn good. I recently got a small glass desk and I love how nice and slim the LCD looks on it. Gives my room a modern look.

OTOH, I have the mother of CRTs as my television (Sony 34" 16:9 Super Fine Pitch Trinitron tube) and I love the thing dearly. Broken HDCP is my only complaint with this TV. The Trinitron tube bangs out godlike colors and the casing is a modern design. Beautiful TV set, I really lucked when I found this one for free. If it's on for a few hours it'll warm up the room.

[lti]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

My computer is too loud to leave on at night.

I still use a CRT monitor for the reasons mentioned above and because I play old games that don't support a screen resolution above 640x480.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

640x480 is the resolution BIOS screens use.
I don't think I've seen a LCD that isn't capable.
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[shovenose]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

My computer is too loud to leave on at night.

I still use a CRT monitor for the reasons mentioned above and because I play old games that don't support a screen resolution above 640x480.

Hmm? an LCD should still go that low right?

[stretch0069]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

OTOH, I have the mother of CRTs as my television (Sony 34" 16:9 Super Fine Pitch Trinitron tube) and I love the thing dearly. Broken HDCP is my only complaint with this TV. The Trinitron tube bangs out godlike colors and the casing is a modern design. Beautiful TV set, I really lucked when I found this one for free. If it's on for a few hours it'll warm up the room.

Those are awesome!!!!....until you have to move it.

[Uranium-235]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

I've really only liked CRTS for KVM's when doing computer work. A lot of computers set on CRT's have a default refresh rate higher, so if we try to use a LCD on these computers, we always get out of range

[weirdlookinguy]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

Those are awesome!!!!....until you have to move it.

Tell me about it! Took me a week to get it into my upstairs bedroom when I first picked it up off CL.

Worth it though

[Topcat]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

I thought I was the last one to get rid of the CRT monitors...I retired my 24" trinitron FD in 06 for a 24" LCD. I replaced my living room 27" CRT for a 50" Sony Bravia in 09.

[Evil Lurker]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

I thought I was the last one to get rid of the CRT monitors...I retired my 24" trinitron FD in 06 for a 24" LCD. I replaced my living room 27" CRT for a 50" Sony Bravia in 09.

Since everything has transitioned to digital and high def is now the norm, CRT's TVs have bit the dust for no reason other than the new picture format is not correct and they for the vast majority lack digital tuners.

And I doubt there are too many analog monitors out there that could produce as good a picture as a LCD with DVI interface. In fact, I dont even see why in the hell they are still putting d-sub ports on motherboards nowadays... I won't even buy one unless it has DVI or HDMI.

[mariushm]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

The DVI to VGA adapter is more expensive than the VGA connector directly on the board. There are still loads of systems build where VGA is enough... surveillance, industrial stuff, cashier systems where they use small 15" monitors that only have vga. There's also the Asian market where I hear they're still using CRT a lot. Not to mention Africa.

Yeah, I'd prefer to have only dvi on a motherboard and maybe displayport - you can derive hdmi and dsub from dvi.

[brethin]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

I still use CRT over LCD for one reason, a CRT will display much greater rez than a LCD for a much lower cost. LCD are nice if your happy with like 1920x1080 but if you need say 2048x1536 or something past todays 1080P selling point the good old CRT's will do that plus if you dont care about wide screen (TV watcher).

[mariushm]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

I have a 17" Eizo - it can do 1920x1200 easily at 75Hz ... but it's murder on the eyes. It's sitting somewhere under the desk now, using it just to test vga video cards and motherboards with onboard video.

I've used a 23" Sony Trinitron (or something like that, above 21" for sure) - I remember it was set at 85 or 100 Hz yet as I was 2-3 feet away from the screen when I was looking in the center of the screen I could see the corners flickering from the refresh rate.

Nowadays, I have a 24" 1920x1200 and a 24" 1920x1080... wouldn't trade them for any CRT.

[gerg]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

Both laptops are off when my wife and I are not using them the modded touchpad has a standby time of a couple of days so that is normally on and my garage pc which is a storage and security system is on all the time it's also a radio when i am working on my oldsmobile

[Pentium4]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

The only CRT left is my 24" Toshiba TV. Does that count?

[seanc]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

My SBS 2003 server is on 24/7 to receive mail. IBM xSeries 206. Nothing more than a glorified PC. P4 2.8Ghz, 4GB RAM, 250GB SATA mirror.
My UPS reckons it's sucking 84 watts of power and will keep it powered up for 56 minutes

The PC downstairs is on all the time. Pentium Dual Core E2160, 2GB RAM, 500GB SATA HDD, onboard VGA, Windows 7.

Both machines use re-capped Antec EA-380 - had to hack an extra power connector on for the IBM.

Just had a dead PowerEdge 800 come in at work, but that's no better than the IBM so I've not much incentive to fix it.

[lti]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

Hmm? an LCD should still go that low right?

Yes, but the scaling quality differs in each monitor. Most LCD monitors have decent scaling hardware, but cheaper monitors and all LCD TVs have terrible scaling hardware.

My parents leave their computer on constantly.

[momaka]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

I recently posted about my neighbors Western Digital that has just under 64K hours and only 200 power cycles (not kidding) I checked it and it had 0 errors.

Yes, the WD running in my PC I use for downloading also has 35k or so hours and no bad sectors. Cycle count is slightly more than 3500.
So like I mentioned in the other thread, turning the computer on and off probably isn't that good for it, but it very likely won't matter over the lifetime of the computer. Now if you're trying to keep that computer running for the next 50 years or so, then it might matter.

As for Pentium 3's, the same computer with the 64K hour hard drive idled at 17 Watts including inefficiency, they don't use anything

Makes me curious about mine then. I'm really thinking about getting a Kill-a-Watt meter. But the money I have saved up right now are to be used for something else... and I'll let you all know what it is this week in the Looking-to-Buy section of the forums.

say what you want about CRTs, but I have 19" that has a resolution no LCD can match.

Hey stetch, there's a guy here in SW D.C. offering 4 21" CRT monitors for free on CL. P.M. me if you want me to send you the links to the posting. Looks like they are still available. I'd take them if I had my own place, but my parents get pretty upset when I bring stuff like that home, so I can't do it anymore. IIRC, 3 of the monitors are Sony (one is a E540 for sure, the other is one of those Lacie monitors used by grahpics designers - also likely a Sony tube again).

In the summer they get turned off when not in actual use.
No reason to pay to heat the house then pay again to cool it off.
n the winter they get left on.

Yeah, when it's cold in the winter, I tend to leave my computers on if I know I'll be using them in an hour or two. Over 2 hours, though, I shut them down or suspend to RAM. We got gas heating over here, which is much cheaper and more efficient than using electricity to heat the house.

c_hegge]^I call them Can't Read This monitors. They take up too much space on my desk, use too much power, the picture isn't quite as sharp as an LCD and I don't even notice the colour differences and refresh rates.

During the day (or if there is a lot of light in my room), I can' tell the difference either, but under low-light, even the cheapest of the cheapest CRTs will beat any LCD screen in terms of color contrast. Most LCDs monitors clip near-black colors to black and near-white colors to white. And even on the more expensive LCDs, I can still see bleeding from the backlight. This also makes the brightness of the picture not uniform (this can be easily seen when viewing dark images). CRTs don't have those problem.
One time I used Photoshop to remove some objects in an image. The background behind the objects was mostly black so all I did was use the clone and smudge tools to make them disappear. It looked fine at the time when I was working on my family's computer (it has an LCD monitor), but when I moved to the computer in my room (has a CRT monitor), I noticed there were a lot of mismatched patches of color on that dark background. Later I checked some of the Photoshop projects I did in high school, and some of them also had this problem.

[Topcat]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

Yes, but the scaling quality differs in each monitor. Most LCD monitors have decent scaling hardware, but cheaper monitors and all LCD TVs have terrible scaling hardware.

You'd be amazed who doesn't understand that. Trying to explain to some goober who's using his 46" vizio TV as a monitor that it looks like shit is easier said than done..... TV's have always, and still do make crappy computer monitors.

I switched from CRT to LCD mainly for desk space. I didn't jump on the LCD bandwagon right away, I let them mature out a good 7 years before I got my first, as early LCD's were garbage image quality. LCD's started really cropping up in the late 90's, I didn't get my first till 2006.....but today, I'll put a good LCD against any CRT, and the LCD will win.

[ratdude747]

Re: Do you leave your computer on 24/7?

damn, the best CRT monitor in the house died last night. it is a 20" mitsubishi... kinda old i guess.

i have a replacement that i will heft up the 2 flights of stairs later int he week, for now, that system has been replaced by a polymoodded imac G5.