Kraya

Since my last blog post, Save the Planet, DON’T Turn your Computer off at night, I have been getting a lot of enquiries from people asking, exactly what happens over night, what about laptops and asking about energy usage and Carbon foot prints.

For laptops the power management setting needs to be set correctly and they should be left turned on and plugged into the internet at least one night a week. For all other computers it is vital that the following procedure is followed at the end of each working day.

• Select Start and Shutdown, from the drop down menu select Restart
• Please do not shut down.
• Please turn off the monitor and leave your computer to restart.
• The machine will restart back to the log in screen and will after 10 to 15 minutes go into a power save mode.
• Given that your monitor is turned off and the hard drives will also go to sleep, the computer will not use much power.
• At the weekend, (unless you are pre-notified of a large update in advance) Shut-down should be used but please also remember to turn off the monitor.

So what exactly does my computer do over night? Well below is a typical example.

20:30   Receiving Updates from Server

Microsoft and other updates are pushed out nightly there will not be an update every night.  However given the number of different software packages in use there is something most nights

21:00   Installing those Updates

22:00   Cleaning temporary and system files, Deleting all of those
temporary files you downloaded over the course of the day.

22:15   De-fragmenting the hard drive, De-fragmenting your Operating
System, in English, tidying up the filing cabinets, so that it can find things faster the next day.

23:00   De-fragmenting any secondary drives.

00:15   Receive Anti-Virus Updates

00:30   Full Anti-Virus Running a full in depth scan on your operating
system

03:30   Full Anti-Virus on secondary drives

06:00   System re-starts, clearing memory ready for you coming into work.

One of the main concerns people have is regarding energy, the cost of that energy and their carbon foot print. Yes leaving the computer on, even in power save mode, uses power and increases your carbon foot print, but this must be balanced with the cost of buying a new PC and the carbon generated by the manufacturing process, flying the parts around the world and shipping the new PC to your office. The Mathematics for this are very complex and depending on the life of the PC replacing more frequently will ultimately be much more expensive, than running it over night.

The greatest advantage to the overnight maintenance procedures is improved day time efficiency, not only in terms of general performance, but energy efficiency. Because of this improved day time computer efficiency the processor doesn’t have to work as hard during the day. It might seem simple but this means it can perform most tasks at less than full speed, this saves power and results in less heat being generated, thus in turn also results in less energy being used to dissipate this heat. Hence greater daytime energy efficiency and lower carbon foot print, from day time usage. The mathematics of balancing these daytime savings versus increased night time usage, are personal to each computer and its use.

Overall I believe the benefits are clear, and all of the users who have had the overnight maintenance schedule fully implemented seem to agree, at least in terms of performance.

Your comments are welcome.