A client called me recently with one of those random computer problems that is difficult to describe. Something wasn’t working quite right, there wasn’t an obvious error message, and nothing had dramatically failed. It was just being weird.
One of my first questions was, “When was the last time you restarted your computer?”
The answer was about a week ago.
Because we manage their computers, I could actually check. It had been three weeks.
I’m not telling that story to pick on the client. Three weeks without a restart isn’t unusual. I’ve seen computers go considerably longer. But it did lead to a conversation about something we probably don’t explain often enough: why are we so insistent that people restart their computers?
There is actually a good reason. Several of them, in fact.
Restarting is part of keeping your computer secure
This is the big one.
Your computer receives updates on a regular basis, and many of those updates aren’t just adding features or fixing minor annoyances. They’re fixing security vulnerabilities discovered in Windows, applications, drivers and other components of the computer.
A lot of the update process can happen quietly in the background. Updates can be downloaded, prepared and even partially installed while you’re working. But there are parts of Windows that can’t safely be replaced while they’re being used.
That’s where the restart comes in.
During a restart, Windows gets an opportunity to shut down those components and complete changes that couldn’t be made while the computer was running. Until that happens, you can end up with an update that is downloaded and waiting but isn’t completely applied.
From our side, we can monitor the computer. We can make sure patches and updates are being deployed. We can see when something hasn’t installed correctly. We can do a lot of the work without you ever knowing we’re doing it.
But eventually the computer needs to restart.
That’s why our clients sometimes see a message from us telling them that their computer has a pending reboot. You can postpone that message twice because we understand that rebooting five minutes before a Zoom meeting or in the middle of finishing a proposal isn’t particularly helpful.
After that, though, the reminder stays.
We’re not trying to annoy you. We’re trying to get the computer into the state it needs to be in so the work we’ve already done to protect it can actually finish.
In other words, restarting your computer is part of your security posture.
Restarting also clears out a lot of accumulated junk
Security isn’t the only reason.
Think about everything that happens on your computer during a normal workday. You open and close programs. Browser tabs come and go. Applications update themselves. Services run in the background. Drivers interact with hardware. Programs allocate memory and don’t always give all of it back cleanly.
Now multiply that by several days.
Most modern computers are remarkably good at keeping all of that running, but they’re not perfect. Applications can develop memory leaks. Processes can get stuck. Services can stop responding properly. A driver can get itself into a strange state. Something that worked perfectly Monday morning can be acting just a little bit odd by Friday afternoon.
A restart gives the computer a clean starting point. Running applications and processes are stopped, memory is cleared, services reload and Windows starts fresh.
That’s also why “Have you restarted it?” is one of the first questions IT people ask.
It’s not because we’ve run out of ideas.
A restart eliminates an enormous number of temporary conditions at once. If the problem disappears afterward, we’ve learned something. If it doesn’t, we’ve also learned something and can move on to figuring out what is actually wrong.
It’s troubleshooting, not an exorcism. Although some days the distinction gets a little blurry.
“But I shut my computer down every night”
Good. Except there’s a Windows wrinkle here that catches a lot of people.
Shut Down and Restart aren’t necessarily the same thing.
Modern versions of Windows can use a feature called Fast Startup. When it’s enabled, shutting down doesn’t always completely shut down Windows in the traditional sense. Windows saves some system information so the computer can start faster the next time you turn it on.
That’s useful, but it also means shutting down and turning the computer back on isn’t always the same clean reset as choosing Restart.
When you choose Restart, Windows performs a more complete shutdown of the operating system and reloads it. That’s what we want when we’re troubleshooting a problem or trying to make sure pending updates have been completed.
So when your IT person asks you to restart, don’t shut the computer down and turn it back on.
Actually click Restart.
Yes, it matters.
“But I have everything open”
This may be the number one reason people keep postponing a restart.
You have six applications running, 14 documents open and enough browser tabs that Chrome has stopped displaying the names on them. Everything is exactly where you want it, and restarting means disturbing the ecosystem you’ve spent the entire week creating.
I get it.
Fortunately, modern applications are much better at dealing with this than they used to be. Browsers can restore sessions. Microsoft 365 applications regularly save your work. Many applications will reopen where you left off.
That doesn’t mean you should blindly restart with unsaved work sitting on the screen. Save what you’re working on first.
But keeping a computer running for weeks because you don’t want to reopen your applications isn’t a particularly good trade, especially when security updates are waiting for that restart.
So how often should you restart?
Our preference is simple: restart your computer every night.
That’s not always going to happen, and we’re realistic about that. At an absolute minimum, we’d like to see it restarted once a week.
And if you see a notification from us telling you there’s a pending restart, don’t ignore it indefinitely. Finish what you’re doing, save your work and restart the computer when you get a reasonable opportunity.
That notification means there’s a reason we’re asking.
Technology has gotten very good at taking care of itself in the background. We can remotely monitor computers, install updates, detect threats and handle a tremendous amount of maintenance without interrupting your work.
But there are still a few things that require the person sitting in front of the computer to participate.
Sometimes the most important thing we need you to do is also the simplest.
Click Restart.