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spampup

25 Posts

13017

March 5th, 2007 14:00

Quick questions re: power schemes settings...

Hi, All,
 
I am using an Inspiron 5150, 3.06GHz HT, WinXP.
 
I have only rarely used my laptop on battery power, and then for short periods of time, so I have never paid attention to the power management settings.
 
I have always had my power scheme set to "Maximum Performance", with no problems.
 
I will be needing to use my laptop on battery power fairly frequently in the near future, so I am trying to learn a bit about the Power Management settings, so I can choose (or configure) the best scheme for me.
 
I completely understand the various settings and options available under the Power Options Properties, and the default settings for each of the available "schemes" seem logical, BUT...
 
I have noticed one thing that has me confused:
 
I was comparing the default settings for "Running on batteries" for the various schemes, and EVERY one of the schemes (except for Always On) has a shorter time set for "System standby" than for "Turn off hard disks"!
 
For instance:
 
Under the Maximum Performance scheme, Standby is set to 5 min, Turn off HD is set to 15 min.
Under the Portable/Laptop scheme, Standby is set to 25 min, and Turn off HD is set to 30 min.
 
I THOUGHT I understood what the standby function was all about. Now I'm not so sure!
 
My questions:
 
1) Shouldn't  the system turn off the hard drive automatically upon entering standby mode?
 
2) Why would I ever want to enter standby mode and keep the disk spinning?
 
Thanks for any comments or advice. I relly want to understand this!
 
Ken
 
 

spampup

25 Posts

March 6th, 2007 19:00

What I guess I'm really confused about is why ALL of the default scheme settings have the time to enter standby set shorter than the time to turn off the disk?!?
 
Strange! Makes no sense to me...
 
Ken

DBrennf

17 Posts

March 6th, 2007 19:00

Standby doesn't keep the disk spinning. It keeps your active work in ram and leaves it powered, so you can restart very quickly. But the hard drive is off.

DBrennf

17 Posts

March 7th, 2007 00:00

I think that what they are wanting is to save your battery. For typical "Portable/Laptop" they are happy if you leave it idle for 25 minutes it will go to standby, then at 30 minutes, if you still haven't done anything, it will turn off. However, for "Maximum Performance", if you leave it idle for only 5 minutes it will already go to standby, rather than waste your watts. Then, if there is still no activity at 15 minutes, it will turn off. And yes, I still think the hard drive is off when in standby mode. Caution: I had set mine to standby when I closed the lid. Bad idea. I had closed the lid, then put it in the briefcase and left it for 3 or 4 hours. When I opened it, I discovered that some transient command had awakened it from suspend and it was in a zipped briefcase for hours trying to keep cool. The thing felt like it had been in an oven. My advice: use "hibernate" or "off" before packing it up.

spampup

25 Posts

March 7th, 2007 04:00

OK, HELP me to understand this... Suppose I have my laptop set to the "Max Battery" Power Scheme, and I'm using it on battery. The default parameters shown for the Max Battery scheme on my laptop are: Turn off monitor: 1min Turn off hard disk: 3min System standby: 2min System hibernates: 5min If I leave the laptop alone, without touching anything, I would expect the display to turn off after 1 minute. OK so far! But THEN what will happen? I would assume the unit would enter standby mode after 2 minutes. Under what circumstances would the system wait 3 minutes and turn off the disk, when it should have entered standby already? What I'm asking is: WHY set the time to enter standby SHORTER than the time to simply stop the disk? It seems logical to me that the sequence should be display off, then disk off, then standby, then hibernate. BUT all but one of the ten factory default power schemes for battery operation on my laptop are set so that the standby time is SHORTER than the disk off time! What am I missing? I think I've surfed the entire net looking for an answer, but no luck! Thanks! Ken

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