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Different Power Profiles under Windows 7, do they matter?

ithehappy

ithehappy

Senior member
I messed up a lot of things last night, which forced me to re-install Windows 7 (64-bit, Ultimate). Now the first thing I do after a fresh installation is installing the needed the drivers, and the very next thing I do is change the default power profile setting. By default the PC is set to go to sleep at 30 minutes interval, I obviously disable that, and then under advanced setting there is this setting called, turn off hard disk, and its set after 20 minutes! Now I don't know, but why would that setting come like that? I mean who would want to turn off their hard disks after 20 minutes? Having a disabled hard drive is same as putting the system to sleep isn't it? This setting doesn't make any sense to me!

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Another thing, I generally change the power profile to Performance, now is there any difference of that preset from Balanced preset? Or by disabling the sleep timer and hard disk disability timer I have made the Balanced preset like Performance already? LOL.
 
It doesn't really make much of a difference for desktop machines that are always connected to a power outlet. But it does make a massive difference on laptops.

I get another 2 hours out of my laptop when it's set to "Power Saving" and around an hour extra on "Balanced".

On desktops it really comes down to how many Watts an hour you save. In a massive company that might help a little with the powerbill, but most companies have moved over to Laptops which use less electricity anyway.

So I'd say, for your home machines, set it to Performance and forget it.
 
If you want your processor to use as much electricity as possible, as well as stressing the components on your board needlessly, set it to the performance profile.
 
mikeymikec said:
If you want your processor to use as much electricity as possible, as well as stressing the components on your board needlessly, set it to the performance profile.
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How does the performance profile stress the components?

The CPU will still use speedstep to dial down. The GPU will also enter idle state and so will unused hard disks.

Even if all the components in the machine were dialed up to their maximum frequency it still couldn't be called "Stressing" the components.
 
smakme7757 said:
How does the performance profile stress the components?

The CPU will still use speedstep to dial down. The GPU will also enter idle state and so will unused hard disks.

Even if all the components in the machine were dialed up to their maximum frequency it still couldn't be called "Stressing" the components.
Click to expand...

On the default settings, the high performance profile leaves the processor performance state at 100% non-stop. If it's running at its full clock speed, it'll have a higher voltage going to it, therefore the components that supply and regulate power to the processor will be under more stress than if processor P-states are allowed to function correctly.

I agree that it isn't the same as the processor usage being pushed to 100% non-stop, but I didn't say it would be anyway. The term "stress" isn't an all-or-nothing term.

The hard disk turns off after 20 minutes.

I don't know if (or how) GPUs are affected by Windows power management settings.
 
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mikeymikec said:
On the default settings, the high performance profile leaves the processor performance state at 100% non-stop. If it's running at its full clock speed, it'll have a higher voltage going to it, therefore the components that supply and regulate power to the processor will be under more stress than if processor P-states are allowed to function correctly.

I agree that it isn't the same as the processor usage being pushed to 100% non-stop, but I didn't say it would be anyway. The term "stress" isn't an all-or-nothing term.

The hard disk turns off after 20 minutes.

I don't know if (or how) GPUs are affected by Windows power management settings.
Click to expand...
Just watching my CPU now, it's dropping down to 1.4Ghz every now and again when I don't do anything. The voltage also drops down. The CPU still uses its own power saving when it can. Just like the GPU, disks and so on.

The Performance profile doesn't affect these inbuilt mechanisms.
 
smakme7757 said:
Just watching my CPU now, it's dropping down to 1.4Ghz every now and again when I don't do anything. The voltage also drops down. The CPU still uses its own power saving when it can. Just like the GPU, disks and so on.

The Performance profile doesn't affect these inbuilt mechanisms.
Click to expand...

Perhaps your performance profile has been altered?

In Control Panel > Power Options, go into the performance profile, then click on its 'advanced power settings', down to 'processor power management', and check the minimum processor state setting. If it says anything other than 100%, then the setting has been altered.

If I switch to the 'high performance' power profile on my Ph2-based PC, it stays at 100% processor clock (3GHz) when the processor is completely idle. As soon as I switch it back to balanced, it clocks down to 800MHz.
 
mikeymikec said:
Perhaps your performance profile has been altered?

In Control Panel > Power Options, go into the performance profile, then click on its 'advanced power settings', down to 'processor power management', and check the minimum processor state setting. If it says anything other than 100%, then the setting has been altered.

If I switch to the 'high performance' power profile on my Ph2-based PC, it stays at 100% processor clock (3GHz) when the processor is completely idle. As soon as I switch it back to balanced, it clocks down to 800MHz.
Click to expand...
Ah I see, it does too 🙂.

Mine was set to 30% on minimum. That explains it. Thanks.
 
It puts the HDD in a sleep state after 20 minutes by default. This doesnt hurt anything, it just means there will be a short wake delay if the HDD is asleep.
 
Yes and AFAIK, if you are using the computer it won't put the HD to sleep until after it has been idle for 20 mins.


sm625 said:
It puts the HDD in a sleep state after 20 minutes by default. This doesnt hurt anything, it just means there will be a short wake delay if the HDD is asleep.
Click to expand...
 
ArisVer said:
I don't see any settings for individual disks.
Click to expand...

I think the settings are for all drives. If your downloading something on disk 2, then disk 1 can go to sleep, (same with disk 3, etc....) but disk 2 will stay active until the downloading is done and the time passes, then it'll sleep.
 
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