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Managing Power Options
Power is pretty much taken for granted
with a computer. As long as the electric bill is paid, the
outlet is working and the system fires up when the power
button is pressed, then all is well. To a point, that's
true, but there are situations where power settings can make
for a better user experience, especially if you're on a
laptop rather than a desktop system.
To access Power Options Properties, right
click an open area of the desktop and click Properties to
open the Display Properties dialog box. Click the Screen
Saver tab followed by the Power button and the Power Options
Properties dialog box will open. There is a good possibility
that the tabs you see at the top of the dialog box may be
different than those shown in the screen capture below. They
vary depending on the type of system involved, whether the
system has a battery, if a UPS (Uninterruptible Power
Supply) is connected, and whether or not the system is ACPI
compliant. In all cases though the Power Schemes tab will be
present and that's the focus of this article.
There are a number of different Power Schemes available via
the drop down box in the top section of the dialog box. Each
scheme is designed to accommodate a specific type of system
use. Click on each one and study the changes it makes in the
four drop down boxes relating to the system monitor, hard
disks, standby and hibernation modes. One of the
preconfigured schemes may very well fit your needs.
If none of the presets are suitable you can create a custom
scheme by manually configuring the settings. Once the
settings have been configured, click Save As... and give the
new power scheme a name as shown in the screen capture
below. At the beginning of
this article I mentioned that the Power Options Properties
might have a different tab layout than what you see on your
screen. Compare the first screen capture with the one below
and you'll see substantial differences, the biggest one
being the Settings area for the power scheme is divided into
two sections; Plugged In and Running On Batteries. Even
though this system is not a battery powered laptop, it does
have a Uninterruptible Power Supply connected. As long as
the system is plugged in to an electrical supply the items
in the Plugged In column apply. If the power fails, the
plugged is accidentally removed, or some other unforeseen
circumstance occurs to interrupt the normal supply of power
then the UPS kicks in and the settings in the Running On
Batteries column take precedence.
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