One of the problems with the immediacy of email and instant messages is that there is the temptation to leave the computer on 'just in case'. Or, it's to avoid the frustration of waiting for Windows to start first thing in the morning.

The Code Project has the result of a survey asking this question and a little surprisingly only half of the voters turn their computer off.

Of course, if you are using Vista, you may not be turning the computer off when shutting down. Individually this probably doesn't use much power but when you consider the millions of computers in the world it quickly adds up.

My solution is somewhere in the middle. I do turn my computer off at night but I use hibernation rather than a complete shutdown. It's not a perfect solution for Windows XP as regular restarts still seem to be a good idea, but that's something I can do at lunchtime.

The only problem is that Hibernation is not always immediately obvious on a computer.

If you use Windows XP and have the shut down menu with icons for Standby, Turn Off and Restart, hold down shift to change Standby to Hibernate. That's after enabling Hibernation of course.