Windows PCs can't sleep properly, and Microsoft wants it that way
The Modern Standby feature in newer Windows PCs never seems to work right.
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I also want it that way. Keeping my steam games updated or keeping apps like discord or slack showing me online is great. I'd rather a modern operating system solve modern issues with modern solutions. They really should have a mode like this in Linux if they don't already.
Just because you won't use a feature doesn't mean the feature shouldn't work for anyone ever. That would be like Windows having a bug where it's stuck in colorblind mode, and a colorblind person comes along and says, "that's fine, I want it that way".
First, you can shutdown completely. You can either issue a command line "shutdown /s now" or you can go uncheck the option "Turn On Fast Startup (Recommended)" It's not a removal of a feature.
Second, this is a default option and Microsoft is choosing the one that works for most humans. You are demanding the thing that inconveniences the most people be the default. So it'd be like a colorblind person demanding that the colorblind mode that works for them be the default way because they are slightly inconvenienced by going to the settings.
You are demanding the thing that inconveniences the most people be the default
Please quote me where I demanded this.
Your colorblind example is literally my example.
I do not care what the default is. Ffs, I don't even use windows except when I have to for work. My ONLY request is for a feature to work, at all, period.
You can shutdown completely, you can hibernate, or you can edit the power plan settings for sleep and remove the network component. Depending on what you want to do.
It's like you didn't even read the article we're all talking about.
I'd like the option of choosing between partial sleep and full sleep. When I pack up my work laptop for the weekend it sucks getting to a Monday morning meeting and having the laptop be dead.
there are several ways to do that. You can either uncheck the setting for fast boot which means a full shutdown or you can just issue the shutdown command shutdown /s now
How does shutting down fix the problem of the computer not sleeping properly?
I'd rather just close the lid and have it not be dead the next time I open it. Sure I could do a proper shutdown if I know I'm done for the day, but in an office running from meeting to meeting that's not always how things work out.
As a Mac user at work I just close the lid and put the laptop in my back. Windows users shut down and power up again the next day.
Whenever I bring this topic up IRL people inundate me with stories about how much issues arise if they just sleep their computers.
Mac is no different though.
Every piece of software has mistakes, the more complex the more mistakes it has.
Normally they don't give much trouble, but their issues can pile up.
So the longer the computer stays working, the bigger that pile gets. Rebooting makes sure you start from a clean slate.
Servers have less problems with it because they don't get modified much and their software is tested for long term.
But your Mac, no matter how much you claim it doesn't cause issues, still does even if you don't notice them.
I guess so, but ultimately if I don't notice them it's fine. I restart my Mac maybe once a month for updates, that's about all I functionally need to do.
Are you trying to convince yourself or the person you're replying to?
Like the other replier and GP, my Linux and Mac desktops run for months at a time without a restart. I only restart when there's a software update that demands it. I don't have much experience with modern Windows, but I expect that's the norm from a modern OS.
If you're running into runaway resource issues like this then you may want to spend a few minutes hunting them down and maybe replace the programs responsible. Daily restarts shouldn't be necessary.
For a phone I'm are more likely than not to have with me, I could understand. But for a laptop, and especially for a desktop, if the machine is asleep, I'm not at it. Why is it great for a computer I don't have with me to show me as online in discord or slack?
It shouldn't show you as online in discord/slack, but it should be downloading messages/etc so that when you do come online you don't have to wait for it to sync with all your cloud services.
Also - consider those cloud services might not necessarily be available when you come online - maybe you open your laptop on a train in an underground tunnel or something.
Macs do a good job at this. They have "high efficiency" CPU cores which are still very fast (like, very fast*) but draw about half as much power as the regular cores. Software is also able to schedule background tasks based on various things like power level, network connectivity, how often the user actually launches your app on this device (maybe you have an app installed on all your devices but only actually use it on your phone...).
Background tasks like checking emails, backing up your computer, installing security patches, etc will all run while your Mac is sleeping.
Anti-theft features run even fully powered off. So unplug the battery, and never plug it back in, if you're going to steal anything with an Apple logo... the fact you can never turn it on does hurt the resale value, but that's better than going to jail. It'll phone home as soon as you boot it up too, and even after a full factory reset is still probably tied to the actual owner. You'll need the owner or Apple to deregister it - and Apple is likely to call the cops unless you've got a good story.
(* to give you an idea how fast the "Efficiency Cores" are on a Mac — in Game Mode the "Performance" cores are powered down, because the efficiency ones are more than fast enough and generate less heat - which allows the GPU to be pushed to the limit of the cooling system. The "efficiency" mostly comes from reducing features like speculative execution... though they do also run at a lower clock speed - as in ~3Ghz instead of ~4Ghz)
I'm not knocking the idea of running various maintenance tasks while the computer is asleep. The original post mentioned installing updates, and I agree that and your ideas make a lot of sense. It's not even a very new idea — I seem to remember the Wii would download updates using its ARM processor while the console was asleep.
OP specifically mentioned "discord or slack showing [them] online", and that's the use case I was questioning.
I do think that, even for legitimately useful uses, I'd still want the ability to turn it off. No matter how low the power draw, there may be times when I need to stretch my battery life a little longer, and I'm in a better position to know and plan for that than the OS is.
We have all kind of things that can run in the background, if they can continue to run but on exponentially lower power, why not?
Sure, there are things that make sense to do in the background. The example of installing updates was a good one. But I was asking specifically about the example that was given of making you appear online on a chat service, because I just can't see the use case for that.
Oh my mistake lol, some people are just social and being seen as present is important to them. I'm not one of them but I know a number of people who are - a few years younger than I which I've wondered if growing up more linked to socials attributes to that mindset.
People in my group use these tricks for work chats to at least look active if they're not. For friends? I don't think I'd care lol.
I would love it if this is how Windows worked for me, but I've never successfully had a Windows machine sleep, wake up to update and then sleep again
