In the previous article I talked about defining waste and came to the conclusion that energy conservation is not sensible unless you can clearly define what electricity usage is not being used but is still powered on (and therefore is waste) and what is actually enhancing the user experience. In many offices, PC’s are only used for basic tasks such as writing letters and other administration, but they are built and powered to do much more. Therefore a lot of the computer power is permanently being wasted, as it is never needed for such basic tasks. This article explains how you can cut back on that wasted energy without compromising on the user experience.
This is a guest article, written by our Dutch work placement student Maarten (AKA M.J.) from the Da Vinci College, Gorinchem. Please note: this article is quite technical. Please don’t try these procedures unless you know what you are doing and/or are willing to risk damaging your machine.
In this article I will show you how to cut back on your electricity bill with some under-the-hood tweaks.
Now roll up your sleeves and let’s get to work!
Undervolting your CPU (Windows Systems)
Did I scare you off? Bear with me for a minute, this tweak is a good energy saver; I assure you it won’t have a negative effect on your system’s performance!
Manufacturers have large safety margins when it comes to the voltage they feed their products. This means that you can feed your CPU less energy while still have it running at 100%. This is called undervolting.
Let’s get to it! For this tweak we need 2 freeware tools, RMClock and Prime95
Start RMclock, go to the Profiles tab.
Check Performance State of the minimal FID, in the example above this is 4.0x.
Select Performance on Demand under AC Power Profile. The option Battery Profile is useful for notebook users, underclocking & undervolting your notebook’s CPU will improve battery life!
Apply and click on Performance on Demand.
Check Use P-State Transitions and the top most P-State, in the example this is 4.0x. Apply the changes and go back to Profiles.
Now we will search for the minimum voltage at the lowest clock speed possible for your CPU. Lower the voltage by one or two steps then Apply.
If your computer crashes right away (don’t worry, this won’t damage your computer) then unfortunately you can’t undervolt your CPU. Is everything running fine, continue.
Start Prime95, check the Blend option. Start ‘torture testing’ (stress testing) your computer. Do this for 5 to 10 minutes then stop, if there are no error reports it means your CPU is still stable and we can continue lowering the voltage..
Go back to RMclock and lower the voltage, repeat the process above until your computer crashes (once again, this will NOT damage your computer).
Once your computer crashes you have found the minimum voltage, remember what voltage that is.
Start up your computer, apply the same settings RMclock except this time make sure you set the voltage two steps higher than the amount where it crashed your computer.
Apply the settings, now stress test your PC again for a few of hours. Got an error report? Increasing the voltage a step, stress test again until the result gives no errors.
Congratulations! You have successfully lowered your computer’s energy use at the lowest clock speed! Now for the highest clock speed.
Go to Profiles, select all P-States, do the same under the Performance on Demand.
Check Auto-adjust intermediate VIDs.
Start lowering the voltage for the highest FID as you did earlier for the lowest FID. Do short stress tests. Continue until your computer crashes. Reboot, restore the settings but place the voltage for the highest FID two steps above the voltage where it crashed, Apply. Stress test for a couple of hours as before.
Now we need to make sure the tweak we just made will boot up with your OS each time. Go to Management, check Start Application Minimized to System Tray, check Run Application Automatically when Windows Sessions Starts.
WARNING: Only check this when you have successfully stress tested your computer!
Congratulations! You have successfully undervolted your computer! Not only will your CPU consume less energy, it will produce less heat, meaning your CPU fan has to work less hard to keep the goods cooled, resulting in even lower energy usage and a more silent fan..
Tip: Choose your hardware carefully to be more energy efficient
If you are looking to make your computer even more eco-friendly, then you might want to consider replacing your hardware components for more energy efficient models.
For example when buying new hard disks, be sure to keep an eye out for the wattage. Two hard disks may have the same capacity and access speed, but may differ on the amount of watt they use.
If your computer is not a heavy-duty gaming machine, you might want to consider buying notebook hard disks instead, these are much more energy efficient. Ask your retailer for the necessary hardware to build the disks into your casing.
Do some Googling and you’ll find some great shopping guides to buying energy efficient components.
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