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More => Old Versions => JRiver Media Center 21 for Windows => Topic started by: mx4789 on March 18, 2016, 08:10:08 pm

Title: Should I let my computer sleep? Should I schedule regular reboots?
Post by: mx4789 on March 18, 2016, 08:10:08 pm
Windows 10, Dell Inspiron. Do most people let their system sleep?  Is that good or bad?  What about scheduling reboots? Daily, weekly?

With all of the recording of shows, should I schedule defrags?

Currently I have it running virus scan weekly during the middle of the night and refreshing the EPG daily at 5am. Is that too often/not enough for the EPG?

Just curious...
Title: Re: Should I let my computer sleep? Should I schedule regular reboots?
Post by: RoderickGI on March 19, 2016, 12:04:34 am
Yes let your PC sleep. It will wake up when needed. All works fine. Some argue for leaving it on all the time. I don't agree with that.

A few people schedule daily reboots, others don't ever schedule them. I do manual reboots every now and then, particularly after upgrades, software installs, and the like.

TV shows are typically written once, then read one or more times. The files aren't modified, except for tagging and such. So a defrag could help if doing lots of tagging. But I don't bother.

I use a real time scanning solution. Rarely do a full scan. Always scan new programs before installation. Works for me. Norton 360.

Daily EPG update at 5am is exactly what I do. Most EPG sources only update daily. If you have a source that updates more regularly, as some do, you can update up to once every 2 hours from memory. No need most of the time, unless schedules change a lot in the short term.
Title: Re: Should I let my computer sleep? Should I schedule regular reboots?
Post by: mx4789 on March 19, 2016, 01:44:55 pm
Just checked windows settings. It is set to defrag (optimize) weekly. My hard drive is 5% fragmented since the 13th.  However, I would like to have been able to change the time setting to run in the middle of the night, but windows only lets you choose daily, weekly, monthly, for optimization. Why it thinks 8:30pm is a good time to perform that task, I don't know. I was curious because I record several shows weekly and then delete them once I watch them. Thanks for the feedback.
Title: Re: Should I let my computer sleep? Should I schedule regular reboots?
Post by: RoderickGI on March 19, 2016, 06:10:09 pm
If the fragmentation is below 10% it isn't worth defragmenting. However, if it grows 5% per week, that would seem to indicate something other than MC is writing and modifying files. I guess that you use the Dell for other activities?
Anyway, Tom's Hardware says this about defragging:
Quote
On your computer with Windows 10, defragmenting only the system drive (C: ) is sufficient. However, if you experience long load times while accessing the files stored in other partitions of the hard disk, you can defragment them as well

Microsoft says this:
Quote
Once Windows is finished analyzing the disk, you can check the percentage of fragmentation on the disk in the Last Run column. If the number is above 10%, you should defragment the disk.

So, opinions, everyone has one.  8)

BTW, I would have though that the Microsoft defrag process, even though scheduled, would only happen when the PC is idle. But I can't find a reference for that. I also can't check the settings you mention, as Norton 360 has taken over control of defragmentation on my PC, so I can't access the settings. Norton "Optimisations" only run when the PC is idle, and if I had defrag turned on it would run with them.

So, is your PC idle at 8:30pm? Maybe it tries to start, and you see that, but then it stops when the PC is in use? I would guess you need to find a Microsoft reference.