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Lots of people leave their PCs on overnight. Often, this is for no good reason whatsoever, it’s just out of laziness. But sometimes it’s a conscious decision: if you want your computer to continue receiving updates, or transmit/receive information of any kind during the wee hours of the night, you need to leave it on. But even the lowest power settings generally burn more power than you need to do that minimal amount of computing.
Now, those people can use a system called Somniloquy. Although this device may be hard to spell, it does offer a cool service. Most computers have four levels of power consumption – regular use, standby, sleep/hibernate mode and completely shut down. A lot of people, including myself, prefer to hibernate their PCs rather than shut them off, because it allows them to start up again more quickly. With Somniloquy, you can hibernate your PC and still have it communicate with other PCs. Check out more details on Phys.org.
As for those who are just leaving their computers on out of sheer laziness - they do not deserve a cool new Somniloquy. They should just turn off your computers.
Via Treehugger
Image via System Surgeon

written by Mandi, April 25, 2009
written by Cameron L., April 25, 2009
So it is better to turn off my computer each night rather than close it and let it sleep?
I wasn't sure if maybe turning it off and back on took just as much power as leaving it on overnight would.
written by andrew, April 25, 2009
written by Glenn, April 25, 2009
written by Bob Wallace, April 25, 2009
I've been off the grid for a long time and (in the winter) need to be very careful about my phantom draws.
Some things are nasty, but not all computers. We've got a netbook (Asus EePC) that pulls only one watt when sleeping. I hope this is the new standard for most computers.
We can't rely on everyone to become "responsible". But we can put responsible devices in their hands rather than ones with built-in inefficiencies.
written by Bob Wallace, April 26, 2009
Most people, including most office workers, could easily use an energy saving "netbook" with a larger screen when/if more viewing real estate is needed.
For CAD, gaming, editing using multiple layers, etc. a more powerful unit would be much more usable. But it's wasteful to use one of these more powerful systems for the simple tasks for which most people use their computers.
(I have a big, nasty desktop with large LCD monitor for serious photo editing. It's a specialized tool that only gets turned on when I need that much power.)
written by Josh, April 26, 2009
Too bad comcast and other ISP/High speed providers are too focused on mobile markets or perhaps the sunray would be available for the general public. I think using this (very low energy) and extremely low maintenance (it has no moving parts) device is extremely marketable.
Anyway - makes the whole idea of "sleeping" a computer ridiculous. I just unplug it - and never have to worry about waiting to start back up.
written by theswampster, April 27, 2009
Having installed a sunray system for a client in the past, I wouldn't blow your green credentials just yet. although your sunray box does use just 4watts, the screen will still be using the same amount. Also your session isn't saved - its still running, in the datacenter running on big power hungry servers - all that will have happened when you remove your card is that the screen will have locked (on a windows session) - the server is still running. There are some power gains to be had with Virtual desktop setups such as sunray (produced by sun, but there are a number of others) if the contention ratio of the server is high enough (i.e. the number of sessions that share the same server) but the total power savings are often not as much as you would think. a better option (from a power perspective) is often with the low power pc - such as the asus eee pc.
written by Bob Wallace, April 27, 2009
In other words, a very power efficient desktop into which one could plug a standard monitor, mouse and keyboard.
And to which one could connect a CD/DVD burner and one or two external hard drives, all of which could be turned on/off as needed.
Drop the stuff that makes the netbook portable and sell the CPU for a lot less money. Lots of people would chose such a unit based on the low selling price and end up saving lots of electricity as a bonus.
written by Mark, April 28, 2009
http://www.tomorrowsworldcompetition.com/
These kids wrote scripts or sent in videos on water efficiency and climate change flooding. Hopefully in the process they'll make a lot people think about their own water efficiency and carbon footprints.
Never hurts to put your ideas out there, so let's encourage them to keep at it. Give them a view and spread the word!
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