is it harmful to move a laptop when it is in slepp mode?

[legolas_w]

Hi
I have a friend with a Thinkpad laptop similar to mine with windows 7 and he freely close the lid (put the laptop in sleep) and move it from one place to another like the laptop is turned off :O

I was wondering whether I can do the same? I mean, whether I can put the laptop into sleep and move it from one place to another like he does?

Is there any risk associated with this considering I have ubuntu instead of windows 7?

Thanks

[Kingsley]

There's nothing wrong with doing so.

[SSTwinrova]

The only* "danger" to moving a laptop while it's on has to do with the heads in your hard drive hitting the platters if they aren't parked. Since sleep == no HD activity == heads parked, I see no reason why it isn't perfectly safe.

That said, it's generally safe to move one even when it's on; just don't do things like drop it or bump it into stuff too often.

*Only one I can think of off the top of my head

[sgosnell]

If your laptop has an SSD instead of a HDD, it's never harmful to move it, nor is it harmful to have the most powerful magnets available next to it. Just sayin...

[dragos240]

What's slepp mode?

[Jesus_Valdez]

I use to move my laptop when it's on "sleep mode". So far, so good.

[lisati]

What's slepp mode?
:) Sleep mode is like "hibernate to RAM"

I use to move my laptop when it's on "sleep mode". So far, so good.
+1

[dragos240]

:) Sleep mode is like "hibernate to RAM"

+1

No, he said slepp mode, not sleep mode. I was joking around.

[schauerlich]

No, he said slepp mode, not sleep mode. I was joking around.

It would have helped if it was funny.

[RiceMonster]

It would have helped if it was funny.

I lol'd

[3rdalbum]

Usually, when you close the laptop lid, the operating system puts the computer into "suspend". This basically turns off power to everything except the RAM, so the contents of RAM are preserved. That is, there's no power to the hard disk or to any fans; so no internal parts are moving, which makes it perfectly safe to move the laptop.

[chriswyatt]

I never even thought about it being bad to move the laptop around when it was on. Never really considered it. They're designed for mobility so if anything went wrong when I was moving it around then I'd say it wasn't fit for purpose.

[starcannon]

I never even thought about it being bad to move the laptop around when it was on. Never really considered it. They're designed for mobility so if anything went wrong when I was moving it around then I'd say it wasn't fit for purpose.
With great technology comes great responsibility, or a hefty bank account.
Spinning hard disks WILL get hosed if they are jarred while moving; it is not a matter of if it will happen, just a matter of when.

Cars are designed to go 100+ miles per hour, so I should be able to safely crash one into a brick wall at full speed, if I get killed, or the car is made unusable by that activity, then I'd say the car wasn't fit for it's purpose...

P.S.
When in Sleep/Hibernate or Suspend mode, they should be safe to move. The hard disk should be parked as has been mentioned in previous posts.

[samh785]

Cars are designed to go 100+ miles per hour, so I should be able to safely crash one into a brick wall at full speed, if I get killed, or the car is made unusable by that activity, then I'd say the car wasn't fit for it's purpose...
Crashing a car at full speed into a brick wall is different than walking around with a laptop while it's running. A car is meant to take very severe damage to its structure in order to reduce the amount of forces that you as a passenger of the car are subject to. Even if that means rendering the car unusable. A laptop on the other hand should be able to be walked around with while it is operating. I'm not saying that if you hit it really hard or drop it or something its supposed to work because a normal laptop obviously (to me) isn't designed to withstand that kind of use. But average every day use like walking or picking it up and moving it to another surface shouldn't be able to hurt it.

[whiskeylover]

Make no noise when you move it. Or you might wake it up, and it'll be pissed.

[Gizenshya]

With the hard drive off, you can treat it just like it is completely off-- it has no extra potential to cause damage to anything. There are several parts of hard drives that can be damaged by movements while on, but they are much more durable when off.

It doesn't matter at all how the hard drive gets to its off position, so long as it is actually off.

[Shpongle]

I carry mine around the house while its on all the time and its been grand so far , i have it three years! and its all good , good all my stuff backed up and a spare hdd (from a friends old laptop) if it does go so im all good. If you careful generally you should be ok if its turned on .

[Marvin666]

I move mine around with the power on. Never had any trouble so far, but I've never jarred it. I also remove a mounted thumb drive, but only when the activity indicator isn't flashing.

[gletob]

I move mine around completly powered up all the time, they're made for it.


Make no noise when you move it. Or you might wake it up, and it'll be pissed.

A true honest to god LOL

[lisati]

It would have helped if it was funny.

Checking back in on this thread. At first I thought it was a typo, but there is a certain humour there as well.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Yiddish_origin

schlep: to drag or haul (an object); to make a tedious journey (from Yiddish שלעפּן shlepn; cf. German schleppen) (OED, MW)

[Gizenshya]

^^ I very nearly made a schlepping comment before my actual reply... but I was afraid the term was too obscure to be recognized by anyone (except musicians).

[amdalex]

I move mine around completly powered up all the time, they're made for it.



A true honest to god LOL

I laughed too.

[legolas_w]

Thank you for your help. Now I am using sleep mode as freely as my friend does. However, I have another question:

What does "Spin Down Hard Disk When Possible" means? does it mean that my hard disk will work less when there is no use of hard disk? Does that works on all laptops (I have a Lenovo T400)?



Thanks again for your help.

[hessiess]

Thank you for your help. Now I am using sleep mode as freely as my friend does. However, I have another question:

What does "Spin Down Hard Disk When Possible" means? does it mean that my hard disk will work less when there is no use of hard disk? Does that works on all laptops (I have a Lenovo T400)?



Thanks again for your help.
It means "Spin Down Hard Disk When Possible" literally. Spinning down the hard drives saves power and reduces the chance of the head crashing if the computer is moved. Yes it can be done on all Laptops and even desktops. Though spinning up and down desktop drives excessively is not a good idea, the same is true, though to a lesser extent with laptop drives.

[chriswyatt]

I've dropped my external drive twice and it's stil fine! Though I'm beginning to think I need to be backing up some of my stuff on it, I've had it for a while now.

My hard drive in this laptop messed up a while ago but I think maybe that's because it had the power management bug which caused it to spin down too much. Everything on the hard drive just seemed to corrupt all at once, was a right pain, had to replace it.

[legolas_w]

Thank you all for your comments.

[NoaHall]

I now resent humanity more than I already did. Nice one.

[soni1770]

do laptops sleep walk,
maybe they dream and if you walk them up by moving them there soul can't return to the laptop- and its look broken

[michaeldt]

I doubt that moving your HDD will cause the heads to crash into the platters. The distance between the heads and platters is so microscopically small, that if either moved a significant amount, they would collide. Hence, drives are manufactured to withstand a certain level of acceleration without crashing.

Many PCs suffer from vibrations, which if allowed to transfer through to the heads and/or platters would cause the heads to hit the platters, which is why drives are designed to dampen external vibrations.

Of course, harder shocks such as dropping the drive could cause this, but if your hdd is falling south, chances are the rest of your pc/laptop is too and you've got bigger (read: more expensive) problems to worry about.