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It's hard to be environmentally friendly when you embrace 21st century technology. For many people, computers and related gadgets are a way of life, and asking many of these people to shut down their devices to save some energy is akin to telling them to stop breathing to save oxygen. Many households leave their PCs on all the time, whether they are using them or not, and while standby and sleep modes do save some energy, there's no doubt that today's computers use up a lot of power. Fortunately, there are ways to reduce your PC power consumption without having to unplug from the rest of the technological world. Here are just a few tips that should help.

Turn Your PC Off at Night
Many people like to start long downloads or other lengthy tasks on their computers just before going to bed. It sounds very convenient; all you have to do is set your computer to perform a task, go to bed and trust that it will be complete in the morning. However, this means that your computer is on and working all night while nobody is using it. It benefits nobody until the end result. If you must perform these tasks, use the “schedule tasks” feature found on most current operating systems to keep your computer in sleep mode until a scheduled time. The Firefox web browser even has an auto shutdown feature that will shut your computer down once a lengthy download is complete.
 
Adjust Your Computer's Settings
PCs and Macs alike have different settings that can reduce their power consumption. The simplest of these is a setting that allows your computer to power down after it's been idle for a period of time. For example, you can have your computer go into energy-saving sleep mode after you get up and walk away from it for 15 minutes. This goes a surprisingly long way in keeping your energy consumption down. The option can be found on a PC's Control Panel or under the Energy Saver pane on a Mac's System Preferences menu, making it an easy-to-use yet valuable tool that could save you some money on your energy bill.

Turn Off Your Screen Saver
Years ago, screen savers were useful in preventing screen burn and other damage to monitors, but these days they are just unnecessary. It takes power to display anything on a monitor, so that screen saver that is supposed to increase the life of your monitor also uses energy. Instead of installing or activating a screen saver, just set your monitor to shut itself down and go black once your computer is idle for a period of time.

Use Laptops Instead of Desktops
In many households, the computer that sees the most use is a desktop. Desktops are generally easier to upgrade, they can accommodate more peripheral gadgets and they are often more comfortable to use. They also use a lot of energy compared to laptops. Overall, laptops consume 90 percent less power than a desktop, so if you don't absolutely need to use a desktop, consider investing in a laptop instead. Laptops even have the additional benefit of being able to run on battery power alone; they only need to be plugged in to charge.

These are just a few of the steps anyone can take to reduce his or her power consumption by switching up his or her computer habits.

 

This article was written by Sheldon Armstrong, a regular contributor here at INFOtainment News. He writes this on behalf of BatteryPlex, your number one choice for all your battery needs! Check out their website today and see what they have for you!


Sheldon Armstrong

Sheldon Armstrong is a regular contributor for INFOtainment News. He loves writing about technology and keeping up with the latest gadgets on the market. In addition, he contributes articles covering a wide range of topics together with his friends who appear as guest writers every now and then.

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Sheldon Armstrong

Sheldon Armstrong is a regular contributor for INFOtainment News. He loves writing about technology and keeping up with the latest gadgets on the market. In addition, he contributes articles covering a wide range of topics together with his friends who appear as guest writers every now and then.

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