I just got a new router (because of problems described in another thread, problems which seem resolved with the new router), and that got me thinking: with my old router, which I had for six years, I’d unplug it when going away for long periods (like a week or more) — for example, I’m going to be visiting home for Christmas for a little less than 3 weeks this year.
Do you ever bother doing so? If so, what’s your time threshold? Did I extend my router’s life at all by doing so?
If I were torrenting something or uploading to online storage I’d leave it on — which means leaving on a computer — but for a week or more I’d probably throw the main switch turning off all electrical power anyway. That cuts out one cause of finding the place gone on return.
It’s good to turn off the router ( or modem/router over here ) for an hour or so, just to let it cool, and reset; but I can’t imagine how unuse would prolong it’s life.
That depends on where you live and when you’re gone, though. Shutting off all your power in the winter is a good way to come home to a ruined house where I live.
Yes, I live in an apartment right now, so that’s not an issue for me.
I usually turn mine off if I’m away for a week or more.
But imagine if everyone did it. Any thieves targeting your house would be able to monitor the wifi and see when you were away.
So you don’t keep anything in your fridge or freezer long-term? Not even condiments?
Nope. I never turn it off.
Tivo needs it to update its listings and I need it so I can remotely program my Tivo if I forgot something or there is some special program or news event while I’m gone.
I barely use the fridge. If I were going away for a few weeks I could certainly sort out that stuff beforehand.
I turn it off and unplug it in the summer just in case we have a thunderstorm. A power surge is unlikely, but I’d rather not have to deal with it.
I unplug it at times.
It makes my creative writing to a file on an external hard drive more fun and more private.
The FiOS router is plugged in to the same surge protector as the TV, cable box, Xbox 360, and Apple TV, which is plugged in to a timer programmed to switch off at midnight and switch on at 600pm every weekday.
I haven’t turned mine off in the eight years we’ve lived in our house, other than briefly to unplug it when new flooring was being installed in the room it’s in and when that room flooded due to a burst pipe. And once in a great while when I unplug it to reset it because I can’t find a pen or it’s too dark to see the reset button.
I found out cutting the power off my cable box for the night may unauthorize my box if they do an update. I would ask your cable company if this could happen to you.
I turn all the electronics off when I go away for longer than a weekend. Also the hot water heater and turn the thermostats down to about 15C.
It’s not a good idea to turn off an ADSL or VDSL router. When you turn it on, it will start negotiating the optimum rate with the other end and this process can take days.
You might consider instead unplugging the cables plugged into it.
Overnight, if it’s bugging me: I live in a studio apartment and sleep in the same room as the router. It’s this big, ugly black box from Xfinity with about eleven big, white LEDs on it that light up the room about enough to read by, so if I’m having trouble getting to sleep, or if I think I’m getting too much of a tan, I kill it.
The only time I unplug mine is to bounce it when it gets hung up, which is like once every few months.
Black electrical/duct tape can fix this problem.
This is interesting. I had never heard of anything like this so I googled it and found someone who says essentially this, regarding BT DSL in the UK: Information about the Legacy Plus Range - Frequently Asked Questions about V1 Software - Affinity | Forum
If this is actually a widespread practice in the industry I’d be happy to be corrected, but otherwise, honestly it sounds like an unsubstantiated anecdote that applies to one service provider in the UK. If someone wants to try to save a little juice by shutting down their equipment every night I don’t see the harm in at least trying it for a while.
(Having said that, there is also the school of thought that frequent cycling of hardware shortens the lifespan of the devices.)
I have been told this directly by telecoms engineers on several occasions. And BT are the main physical internet provider over here - they lease out to almost all the ISPs. So what they say applies to almost all the ISPs.