Is this really all that useful? I have a Media PC in my den and I have never turned it off - its been on for the last 6 or 7 months - I couldn't tell you how long it will take to boot up - don't care.
At work boot times are not important either. We leave workstations on 24/7. The reason is there are operations being performed on them and operations those are scheduled for after hours. For example, if there is an upgrade to a program, a security patch, etc. SMS sends it to the workstation over night so that it is ready to be used the next morning. Antiv-virus scans and pattern file downloads, disk cleanup and defrag chores are also scheduled and run every night. Even if our workstations were booted up in the morning, what consumes most of the time until the computers can be used are scripts, etc. being downloaded to the OS as it starts up from the domain servers.
Likewise, my home office computers are kept on 24/7 for some of the tasks above, plus if I need to get something for a personal matter while at work I can do so.
And, by the way, boot times have been reduced in each new version of the Windows operating system. Also, Microsoft, Intel, the major hardware verdors and BIOS vendors are working to reduce boot times. That effort may be incorporated into computers as early as next year. Whether these new innovations will allow "instant on" remains to be seen.
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