You can
reduce power consumption and achieve significant energy
savings when using your PC simply by acquiring a few good
habits. Read the handy tips below.
The monitor
In a
PC, the display is greatly responsible for overall energy
consumption. Some estimates for laptops show that the
monitor accounts for 40% of total energy consumption. The
figure is not much different for desktop PCs. LCD monitors
typically require between 15 and 60 watts, while a CRT
(cathode ray tube) screen requires between 50 and 125 watts.
In
order to reduce energy consumption and in particular battery
consumption, it is recommended to not change the standard
configuration set by the manufacturer. In fact, after a
certain period of inactivity, the monitor automatically
“goes to sleep”. In this mode, it consumes just 1 to 3 watts
of energy.
Windows
operating systems, in particular from Windows XP onwards,
allow you to easily adjust the monitor’s sleep cycle. To
lower consumption, you can shorten the idle time, activating
the sleep phase earlier and so saving energy.
Another
important factor in energy consumption as regards the screen
is its brightness. It’s natural to write in black on a white
sheet, but a very bright page is heavy on consumption, and
strains the eyes. Therefore, experts suggest that screen
brightness be reduced until your eyes are comfortable. In
this way, especially for laptops, battery consumption can be
greatly reduced and battery life lengthened.
PC hibernation mode (This
may not be an option for your business. We recommend
you have a conversation with your network administrator.)
The
most effective way of reducing consumption when your PC is
not in use is to put it in hibernate mode. Rather than
shutting down your PC every day, restarting it, then
re-opening all your applications, it is much better to
“suspend” PC activity, because energy consumption in this
mode is roughly 5 watts for a desktop PC and 1 watt for a
laptop.
In
Windows Vista and later systems, you can also save energy by
setting your PC to awaken from hibernation to execute
scheduled tasks. For example, with the TV program recording
function, you can set your PC to activate itself and record
your favorite program at a set time. After completing the
recording, the PC returns to hibernate mode.
Switch off the Wi-Fi antenna
Today’s
laptops and some desktop models are equipped with antennas
for transmitting and receiving data via radio waves using
hotspots, microcells equipped with Wi-Fi antennas that
comply with wireless standards 802.11 a/b/g/n and allow
Internet browsing in bars, airports, at work, or in the
home.
Radio
antennas consume a lot of energy and battery power when they
kick into operation. Windows Vista and Windows 7 natively
support the ability to disable the laptop antenna when not
in use. This ability to disable the antenna for short
periods of time helps to prolong battery life.
New
Windows PCs normally have the Wi-Fi antenna enabled for best
performance, meaning they are not configured for power
saving. So it is up to you to use your wireless antenna in a
way that maximizes battery life. If you don’t need to browse
the Internet or connect, you can switch the Wi-Fi antenna
off completely.
Regulate Windows Search
indexing
One of
the most interesting changes in Windows Vista is the ability
to index all PC content, from e-mails to documents to
images. This is a task that Windows Vista performs in the
background or while you are doing something else, but it’s a
task that inevitably consumes energy.
There
are three possible settings for the Windows Search indexing
system:
