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Posted By : Chad of Data Doctors on December 28, 2004

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The Windows Power Manager allows you to customize how and when your computer runs, and is the topic of this week’s tip.

This question was answered on December 28, 2004. Much of the information contained herein may have changed since posting.


Everyone should manage their computer’s power differently according to how they use it and whether it’s a battery powered laptop or desktop workstation I prefer to just have my monitor turn off after an hour of inactivity Others may wish to have their computer standby or hibernate after a certain amount of time Power conservation is essentially the goal and therefore your monitor is likely going to be the biggest issue

Follow the steps below:

1 Right-click on an empty portion of your desktop and choose Properties

2 Select the Screen Saver tab.

3 Click the Power button.

4 A gray window should appear with several options that tell the computer when to turn the monitor and hard drives off, or put the system in standby or hibernation (hibernation only available for Windows XP users).

There is no one way to configure these settings; experiment to see what suits you best I will say if you’re going to use the standby or hibernation options, pick one and disable the other I would recommend hibernation over standby as it powers the computer all the way down, protecting your data in the event of a power outage As I touched on before, the monitor consumes the most power and will be the most advantageous to shut down when not in use Don’t make the “time to shutdown” too short as constantly powering the monitor and computer on and off can cause unnecessary wear-and-tear on internal components Turning the hard drives off conserves some power and should lower the computer’s internal temperature a bit So, go ahead and put the power back in your hands, and save some energy in the process Enjoy!

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Posted by Chad of Data Doctors on December 28, 2004

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