Rob Beard wrote: > andy wrote: >> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- >> Hash: SHA1 >> >> I've been listening to the BIG GREEN IT DEBATE on the register.. and >> although it's no where nearly finished (more or less just started).. >> there's already one point I'd love us to discuss. >> >> One of the things that comes up when discussing 'Green motors' is what >> I'd like to introduce as the Land Rover paradox. >> >> "70% of all Land Rovers ever made are still on the road." >> >> Once you take into account the energy required throughout the life of a >> car, including assembly and destruction - are Land Rovers actually that >> bad for the environment. >> >> IMHO, ubuntu may fit into the Land Rover, rather than Toyota Prius >> category, for a number of reasons. >> >> 1) Power Management - where are we at with ubuntu at the moment? My >> perception (this will/may be wrong) is that much of the onboard power >> management is managed through propreitary code, therefore ubuntu >> performs worse that XP.. par example (but much better than Vista.. on a >> hunch). >> > > My dual core 'Pentium Dual Core' is happily running at 1.2GHz at the > moment (slowed down from 1.8GHz), it's independent per core too. That's > all controlled by the Powernow Daemon... > > Here's the output from powernowd --help > > "PowerNow Daemon v0.97, (c) 2003-2005 John Clemens > Daemon to control the speed and voltage of cpus. > > This is a simple client to the CPUFreq driver, and uses > linux kernel v2.5 sysfs interface. You need a supported > cpu, and a kernel that supports sysfs to run this daemon." > > Sounds to me like it's GPL'd. > > It is controlled by Powernowd too, when I tried to overclock my CPU to > around 3GHz it kept going back to 1.8GHz/1.2GHz until I disabled > powernowd which in turn disabled the power saving. > > That's better than my desktop PC at work running XP which sometimes > sounds like a jet engine taking off (it's a Dell Optiplex GX620 with a > Pentium D 820 (2.8GHz) with power saving turned off in the BIOS). > >> 2) Re-use. Ubuntu saves having to re-buy PCs... However, if the >> efficiency of the new PC means that it'll use less energy, surely >> there's an argument that upgrading the hardware is more environmentally >> efficient - we need some better data to support the ubuntu approach (if >> there is indeed one). > > Ubuntu can be used in a client/server environment just like Windows > 2000/2003 Server. This is what I'm doing at a local community centre in > Exeter. We're using a fairly mid spec Dell PowerEdge server with a new > Intel Xeon Quadcore CPU (2.4Ghz) which will run Ubuntu (or possibly > Edubuntu) with LTSP. The client machines are old K6/2 450 machines > which according to the AMD specs use no more than about 36 watts. Add > on the fact that they run completely over the network (no hard drives, > no optical drives) they don't have any moving parts (apart from the CPU > & PSU fans) and save energy. They'll be attached to 19" TFT monitors. > > I'd say they'd use less than my desktop PC with it's hard drives and DVD > drive in there. > >> 3) Linux versus MS. Is there anything to suggest that linux boxes are >> more power efficient. This doesn't have to be at a hardware/software >> level either. More about policy and application. Linux boxes don't >> crash, so we never shut them down.. meaning they're never off. Discuss. >> > > Not sure on that, I'd say efficiency wise, they're probably about the > same. I guess you could argue that Vista with all it's fancy effects > requires a fairly decent spec CPU and graphics card whereas Ubuntu will > run it's fancy effects on a much lower spec machine. > > With regards to never shutting the machines down, it depends on the > user. Some people leave their machines on due to lazyness (I can think > of a couple of people at work who do this), others leave them on because > they run background apps. I guess both Linux and Windows when idle will > use much less power plus put the screens into a standby mode. > > Not sure if anyone is aware, but next month is Green Month, at least it > is on the One Network of radio stations > (http://commercial.gcapmedia.com/index.php?id=8 - Gemini in Devon, BRMB > in Birmingham, Red Dragon in Cardiff etc). > > In the stations we're trying to save energy by turning PCs off > automatically at night (this is done through Active Directory), enabling > power saving on newer PCs which support it, reminding everyone to turn > off their monitors when not in use, combining PCs (such as legal logging > machines which need to log output 24/7, these are being combined in some > cases from two PCs to one), and even in some extreme cases turning off > all the lights (including the lights in the toilet even when someone is > in there). > > >> I'm coming in at a tangent, but would be interested to hear other >> people's perceptions of the 'Green-ness' of ubuntu - and some input from >> people who can give hard facts on the performance of ubuntu power >> management. > > See comments above. > > When we've installed the LTSP system at the community centre in Exeter > I'm going to measure the power usage of the single terminals and the > whole installation (server, terminals, switches etc) and compare them to > a regular 1 to 2 year old desktop system running XP, it will be > interesting to see how it compares. > > Rob
I wondered if this applied to my vanilla desktop so I opened a terminal and typed powernowd the response: powernowd: PowerNow Daemon v0.97, (c) 2003-2006 John Clemens Go away, you are not root. Only root can run me. made me smile :-) Not only is is green, but it has Attitude! -- alan cocks Kubuntu user#10391 -- ubuntu-uk@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-uk https://wiki.kubuntu.org/UKTeam/
