PC power management

Effective PC power management comes down to raising awareness, training staff and pupils to turn off PCs and monitors when they are not being use for any length of time, and ensuring power-saving functions are enabled on PCs and laptops.

Setting up power-saving functions on your PCs and laptops

Most PCs can easily be set up to shutdown automatically if they have not been used for a predetermined period of time.  Note that some equipment may need to be left on, e.g. if it acts as a server for other machines - if you have any doubts about whether it is safe to switch anything off please talk to your IT Technician before proceeding.

PCs and laptops running Windows XP should be set to go into Hibernate mode if they have been idle for a while - Hibernate mode essentially turns the machine off whilst remembering what programs and files were open, so that when the machine is powered up again it returns to how it was - usually within a few seconds.  This is preferable to Standby mode, which still leaves the PC powered up, and saves relatively little power.

To enable Hibernate mode in Windows XP, follow the instructions in the following link:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/mobility/getstarted/hibernate.mspx

If you have any queries, please talk to your ICT Technician, or contact the IT Helpdesk on 01962 847007, or email edicthelp@hants.gov.uk.