April 22, 2009 is Earth Day! Did you know that you can adjust the settings on your PC laptop so that it will consume less energy? Here's how:

There are three main components of a laptop that consume significant amounts of electricity (in approximate order): the screen, the processor, and the hard disk and DVD drive. The screen is the single most power hungry part of the laptop, and the most gains can be achieved there. Modern laptop processors provide some power saving features, but they also produce heat which requires active cooling with fans. And finally, hard disks and DVD drives are the last "moving parts" components on a computer. A hard disk that is powered up is spinning the drive platters 90-120 rotations each second.

To get to the power management settings on your laptop:
- Click on the Start button
- Choose Settings
- Choose Control Panel
- Choose Power Options
or
- Right click on the desktop
- Select Properties
- Select the Screen Saver tab
- Click on the Power button

Under the Power Schemes Tab, in the Power Schemes area, select
Portable/Laptop.
Under the Settings for Portable/Laptop power scheme area choose:
- When computer is Plugged in
- Turn off monitor after 15 minutes
- Turn off hard disks after 10 minutes
- When computer is Running on batteries
- Turn off monitor after 5 minutes
- Turn off hard disks after 5 minutes

Other suggestions:
- Put your laptop to sleep when it is not in use, or shut it down
completely if it will be unused for more than 8 hours.
- Use the "airplane mode" switch on the front edge of your laptop to
turn off the wireless if you aren't using it. It will save a measurable
amount of power.