Batteries and Power Management 
Managing Power Consumption 
 
46  Reference Guide 
 
Managing Power Consumption 
When you’re running your notebook on battery power, you will want to maximize 
operating time without compromising performance. Your notebook is designed to help 
you reduce power consumption and extend battery life without needing to turn it off. 
?? During idle periods, the notebook automatically enters power-saving modes after 
specified timeout periods. You can adjust these timeouts to suit your working habits.  
?? You can manually send the notebook into a power-saving mode at any time by 
pressing the appropriate key—see “To manage power manually” on page 48. 
How the notebook manages power automatically 
Your notebook automatically goes on standby or into hibernation and standby, and turns 
off the hard disk and display based on values set in Power Options in Control Panel.  
Automatic action  Occurs after…  To resume… 
Turns off hard disk. 
Turns off the hard disk drive. This is usually 
set to occur shortly after the display is turned 
off. 
The hard disk is not accessed 
for the specified interval. 
Begin using the notebook: 
the hard disk turns on when 
needed. 
Turns off display. 
Turns off the display to conserve battery 
power and extend the life of the display. 
No keyboard, pointing device, or 
other input activity occurs for the 
specified interval. 
Press any key or move a 
pointing device to turn on 
the display. 
Enters standby. 
Maintains your current session in RAM, and 
turns off the display and other components to 
conserve battery power. 
No pointing devices are used, 
no disk drive is accessed, and 
no port is active for the specified 
interval. 
Press the power button to 
resume your session. 
Enters hibernation. 
Saves your current session to the hard disk, 
then turns off the notebook.  
The notebook stays on standby 
for the specified interval. 
Press the power button to 
resume your session. 
Lowers CPU speed (Pentium models only). 
Switches to the lower CPU speed to use 
power more efficiently. See below. 
The AC adapter is unplugged.  Plug in the AC adapter.