What is difference between Sleep Mode and Shutdown in Mac OS X Lion.

I was just going through the Mac Apple forums and I read an article it stated that for the desktop Mac Apple recommends the Sleep mode instead of a power down if you are not going to use your Mac for few days. Even for the Laptops they recommend sleep mode instead of power down, if you are not going to use it for long time. There engineers state that frequent “inrush” of current can affect some components, and frequent heat and cold cycles can will harm the system. When the Mac is put in the sleep mode most of the things like disk, display are powered down, but some amount of power still remains for some of the components. But at the time of power down you completely shut down the computer and there is not even a single watt of power supplied to the MAC. I want to know what the exact difference between Sleep Mode and Shut is down in MAC OS X Lion. Can anyone explain me this please. It’s very confusing so want some help in regards of this.

Sleeping a Mac will always be my preferred choice as it provides me with easiest and the quickest way to resume my work without harming my hardware. It is instant ways to make a Mac sleep and when you wake it up you have all your applications, windows arrangements, web pages and documents exactly then and there where you left it. Mainly this will be accessible without any delay. For the Mac user who is constantly on the system and uses the system frequently and those who want to get access to what they were doing, keeping the Mac on sleep mode is the best option. A computer always will use less power in the Sleep mode that it uses in the wake mode. It will always supply power to the Ram while being in the sleep mode as the RAM stores all the information when the computer went to sleep so it needs to regain all that information at the time when the computer wakes. This also indicates that computers with higher RAMs will use slightly more power.

I’ll let you know what exactly are the pros and cons of keeping the computer on the sleep mode. The advantage is this that you can quickly resume your work and start off from where you left your work. You can even schedule the wake time or you can even do it remotely. The disadvantage is that there will be minor amount of power consumption. Cache files, system temp will not be cleared during the reboot process. System will not be updated automatically as the system update requires rebooting. You can enjoy best performance if you are using 4GB or more than that Ram. If you use your Mac every day its better you keep your system on sleep mode but don’t forget to reboot it once in every two to three days. Hope this helps you to understand what sleep mode is and what are its pros and cons.

Hey friend let me tell you what exactly happens in the sleep mode so that you will come to know what exactly sleep mode is. Let me first tell you what sleep mode causes in all Macs and then I’ll tell you what exactly it does on portable Macs. When you keep your Mac on the sleep mode the microprocessor enters into the low-power mode. The video output will be turned off, and the display will turn off and will go in the idle state. The hard disk will spin down. These are the things which happen on all the Macs now let me tell you what happens on the portable Macs. Expansion card slot will be turned off. If the built in modem is connected then it will be turned off. The USB port will only respond to the power key of the external key board. The optical media drive will stop spinning and even the Audio input and output will turn off. Portable Macs do not have network access in the sleep mode, but if you want to keep the network connectivity then you can simply enable the energy saver option i.e.“Wake for network Access.” Hope this help you in more technical way.

I basically shut down my computer as I don’t use it frequently. You should always shut down a Mac when you are going in some sate of inactivity for long term. Shutting down a Mac is a bit slower as all the applications working on the system will close and afterwards when you turn your machine on, you have to open all the applications again and get back where you earlier were. It is a bit time consuming task but will always save your power consumption. To make resuming fast OS X Lion has made an application which will help you restore your window automatically, it will restore all the applications on which you were working previously. But it is still not instant, and it does not restore your applications as quick as it does in sleep mode. So I feel if you have regular work better keep it on sleep mode, if you don’t have regular work better shut down your computer.

I’ll just brief you the advantages and disadvantages of shutting down your Mac. One of the most important advantages is Power saving, it will save the power for you. System temp, cache and memory will get cleared out during boot. It will allow all the major system updates to install properly.

The only disadvantage is that it will take some time to boot and let you resume your activities. I don’t think there is any disadvantage leaving this. The people who are power conscious and want that to increase the life span of the Hardware and hard disk should always shut down to increase the durability of the system.

Shutdown means to turn off power. When I don't want to use my system ,keep shutdown. While in sleep mode a computer always use less power.
The benefit to keep Mac in sleep mode is you can easily resume your work without wasting time.