Talking Technology Tricks

Time and 'energy' saving tricks for your electronics (and yourself) 

Having your laptop battery die every 15 mins and losing your unsaved work can be a pain and a total waste of your time and energy, but with these few helpful tricks you to can save precious time and energy, excuse the pun... cough cough

Power save/ turn off at night 

1. Buy energy efficient products

2. Use build in power saving features

3. Turn down the brightness

Turning down the brightness of the computer monitor, or any other monitor actually, saves energy. 

4. Turn off the monitor instead of using a screensaver

Turning off the computer monitor instead of running screensavers saves lots of energy.

5. Disable devices that are not needed

E.g. DVD drive or sound card.

6. Turn off the computer

It might not make sense to turn off a computer system when going on a 5 minute break but it definitely make sense for longer breaks, e.g. lunch or meetings.

7. Share hardware where appropriate

Hardware like printers, scanners or routers that are connected to a computer system are also using power. A way to save energy is to share these devices where possible. 

Battery life – run it til its dead

1. Lower the lights

The LCD screen of a laptop is another huge power sink. Calibrate the brightness to the lowest level you can tolerate using the Function key toggles or using the Display Settings applet in the Control Panel.

2. Kill the sounds

Mute the speakers and try avoiding the use of multimedia software to maximize the battery life. Installed sound schemes also drain a battery perceptibly.

3. Rid the screensaver To maximize battery life by a little, switch off the screensaver.

4. Visit Power Options

Padded bags – keep protected when traveling and in turn helps your computer last longer. 

NB* Links provided are for interest of the general public and offered as an assistance tool only. Inclusion of any links to external company websites are not based on any direct connection, affiliation or formal relationship with Talking Matters.