I know that a normal pc is designed to run for long periods of time without needing to be shut down or restarted. I also know that CAD programs, Solidworks in particular tend to build up and retain memory, and that memory has to be released every so often in order to maintain performance. For years, I have been in the  habit of turning my machine off every night and restarting it the next morning. I also try to keep it clean of junk. This has served me well.

However we have some new IT (not CAD) guys telling us not to shut down the machines unless absolutely necessary. They also have them set up to do full scans every time they are started up and doing checks every five minutes. This slows things down tremendously, especially at startup. I am an admin, but can't turn it off. I might be able to get this changed. What do you guys recommend from a CAD standpoint? A CAD machine is a different animal...