I have my computer running usually 24/7. I usually shut down and restart once a week so that it clears the RAM.
The Heat Flucuation Theory is pretty wrong, The only reasons this would be correct is if your running a big server with multiple 10,000 RPM drives with poor cooling for months on end, the reason this would be a problem is because being that the drives are running so fast they heat up to high temps and instantly turning the power off could cause problems with internal components of the drives themselves. The other case would be if you running a nice system with little or no cooling, which in either case your fucked.
I work at a software support helpdesk and just had a client where when i dialed in had around 70 popups up causeing PCanywhere to run as if it were connected to a dialup connection. Before calling the helpdesk he had run adaware, (not sure if it was updated) but it was still doing multiple popups. To correct all of this i started by going into safe mode and going into MSconfig (only WinXP) and disableing any and all suspiscous processes. we rebooted the machine and nothing popped up yet (we had not opened up IE) i then ran Spybot S&D, it found 150 entries. fixed those, then went into Add/Remove Programs and removed any spyware programs, which there was about 20. then went into c:\windows\prefetch and deleted any files that were in there (130 files) because There is a virus out there that resides in the prefetch called UpdateXP2, i didnt know if this guy had it but why risk it. We then restarted the computer so spybot could get the rest of the entries that it couldnt with windows running. then i cleared the cookies, cleared the temp internet files. Opened up Windows explorer and WHA LA no more popups, not a single one no matter what site i went to. even went to bigboobies.com (jk).
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I never defrag or do any "cleanup." All my crap is organized though...
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Defragging Despite popular opinion (at least on this board) is ALWAYS RECOMMENDED, no matter how organised you are (which makes no freakin sence what-so-ever) Defraggin does not organise your files and make them look pretty, It organises the data and how it is stored on the drive makeing your computer run much faster. when data is written onto your hard drive, your hard drive will somtimes break up the data to write it faster causing fragments (spaces in data writing) and just finding the first available space to write a peice of data. Though this may cause the program to install faster, when the program actually runs its going to take longer because it has to look everywhere for the bits of data the program uses. Defragging takes this data and groups it so that the hard drive can more easily find the bits needed.
I hope you all enjoyed, Take care of your computer, it can be your best friend or your worst enemy.
Tom