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Microsoft One Step From World's Greenest Company
An anonymous reader writes "According to this article, Microsoft is only a few lines of code away from becoming the greenest company on Earth."
From the article:
"Redmond should issue a software upgrade to every computer running Microsoft Windows worldwide to adjust each machine's energy-saving settings for maximum efficiency."
The author figures that the upgrade would affect 100 million computers and that the power cost savings could hit $7 billion per year. CO2 emissions would be cut by 45 million tons. But what about the impact on computing?
Install Linux! Pollute the Earth!!!!!1111
What a phenomenally stupid idea. I have personally used a half-dozen machines where enabling "power-saving" is a recipe for operational disaster. Machines that power off completely. Machines that lock up. Machines that do something and never come back.
I think the lack of foresight on TFA's part with this inane suggestion reflects pretty accurately on how seriously we should take the article as a whole.
People who need better performance would change the settings. The vast majority of people don't need better performance. The vast majority would be okay (performance-wise) running a slightly souped-up C128 with GEOS and the Wave.
Please disable "screen saver" feature altogether. DPMS sleep modes work much, much better for "screen saving" (and screen saver of course do not save energy at all). Flying shits and "nice" landscapes may be kinda fun for a first time but that time ended about 20 years ago. Oh, same applies to all unices and macs of course. I have colleagues who have screensavers running on there PCs/laptops for _days_ (as on weekends) and monitors never go to sleep. Sigh.
I've seen server rooms that run off DC and have substantial power savings.
Google suggested a new standard for ATX power supplies that is supposed to have again, substantial power savings.
There are solutions out there without a doubt. Big businesses would save money on their bills.
So why is no one interested in saving money?
Bueller? Bueller?
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
Car companies could drastically reduce emissions is they would would just limit all internal combustion engines at 3000rpm. Think of what this would do for emission levels.
Or that the engine would shut itself down if you let it run stationary for 30 seconds.
I think I just solved the entire global warming issue!
Onwards to the meaning of life!
What they should do is allow machine power settings to be controllable from an Active Directory policy object. Network admins would then have fine control of the power usage of their desktops.
This blogger should lead by example and turn his machine off.
Permanently.
How would this make Microsoft the greenest company? As far as I can tell, it wouldn't. It would make the companies that use MS products greener companies. It would have nothing to do with the net energy that Microsoft uses.
It's like sex, except I'm having it!
Vista already seems to have a more power-saving profile by default, I was surprised when I couldn't VNC into it a few hours after leaving. Turned out (when I physically got there) it entered the suspend mode. Needless to say (but I'll say it anyway, hah!), the power settings are back at Always On.
While dropping the monopoly word in here is a sure fire way to get modded up, it just amazes me that a community of people who run two, three, or more different OS's, on different hardware platforms cry monopoly at every chance with Microsoft but do not when they are complaining about being stuck with a 3mbit cable modem, or unable to get bare copper lines for DSL back in the day, or even able to get FIOS TV because their town granted a monopoly to the local cable company.
There are REAL monopolies impacting people in the US vastly more than the anti-Microsoft brigade seems to understand.
Its a very myopic view of things.
Can you imagine the support nightmare Microsoft would unleash upon themselves if they did what the article suggests?
Articles like this underline a huge problem in the software industry. Too many people think that software is easy, and that all any problem needs is a few software tweaks. Too many people are willing to offer up solutions without thinking the issue all the way through.
It is attitudes like this that lead to failed billion-dollar IT projects, most of what is offered on the Daily WTF, and VB hacks promoting themselves as software engineers.
Life is like a web application. Sometime you need cookies just to get by.
Apparently unlike some I actually read TFA.
;-)
I don't see where Microsoft commented one way or the other. What we have is a blogger with an idea to inflict power saving modes on people. MS is *way* smarter than that.
It's one of the down sides to free speech on the internet - even people who have dumb things to say can be instantly (and globally) published.
we see things not as as they are, but as we are.
-- anais nin
1. Invest in energy companies.
2. Change software to burn more energy.
3. Profit!
I figured out that my PCs were consuming more electricity than my fridge, dish washer, and clothes washer. Combined.
I made a chart of actual electricity use of various PCs and Macs on my blog: PC and Mac power consumption.
In a nutshell, my annual power consumption went down by 30% (!) once I started to power down my home-built "home server PC" when not in use.
I also figured out that when buying a new PC that is going to see a lot of use, power consumption should be a factor. If you're saving $100 in purchase price, but spending $50/year for additional electricity because the cheap PC's power supply is grossly inefficient, well, have you really saved anything if you keep that machine for 3 years? The short answer. NO.
Of course wasn't it Microsoft that implemented all of the power down features because it took so long to boot Windows in the first place that people didn't want to wait so long for the computer to power on? Wasn't it also the bloated Windows code and feature creep that made it necessary for ever faster cpu, ram, video and storage requirements, which all equate to more energy consumption? Isn't also true that Microsoft Vista is going to tax these resources even more? So, isn't it a bit hypocritical to talk about how "green" Microsoft would be by forcing computers to power down?
Maybe a better solution would be an OS designed to run on lower powered devices from the start instead of trying to make the high horse powered PC of today more efficient. As an analogy, although there have been improvements with technology, an eight cylinder automobile is not going to ever be as fuel efficient as a four cylinder one. Nor will a four cylinder be as efficient, say as a fuel-cell powered one. Likewise, as long as the system requirements to just run Windows (not even applications on Windows) keeps increasing, the PC will continue to consume greater and greater amounts of power.
We all know, even if we don't want to admit it, that personal productivity for the business masses, anyway, has ceased to improved, at least significantly, from the latest releases of Windows. Why? Because of those 600 million computers quoted in the article, most are used for things like word processing, simple spreadsheets and surfing the web and to do email. Stuff that computers capable of running Windows 2000 and Office 2000 (if not earlier versions) still do quite well. Sure new versions make it easier to get pictures of our cameras and to create music, etc. But the vast majority of people aren't seriously doing that work and those that are, use specialized tools, anyway.
Now, many will argue, and I would agree, that hardware is cheap, relatively, anyway. However, the point of the article was not about cheap hardware, but about saving energy. And the point of the matter is that as long as we keep adding fluff and flash to the OS, forcing bigger and faster computers, which translates into greater power consumption, they will never be "green." Even if they do power down when not in use, they will still use far more energy than is needed to actually perform the task while they are on.
If Microsoft wants to truly be known as a "green" company, then they should design the next version of Windows so that it runs on less hardware than what is currently required, so we don't have keep to filling up the landfills with technically good computers that become obsolete, just to stay compatible every time Microsoft releases the latest version of Windows.
The title of the article as "Microsoft One Step From World's Greatest Company"
Suffice to say i almost fell off my chair
Hardware is toxic and energy intensive to produce and to dispose of. MS pushes a short hardware upgrade cycle, aiming to get its customers to make new hardware purchases every two years or so. Remember not only do later versions require newer hardware, eventually out-growing old hardware, most of MS' income is from Windows sales and nearly all of that is from OEM sales. Thus, MS is economically dependent on a short life span of units with unreasonably large ecological footprints.
Say the ecological footprint of hardware is the same over time.
You get the idea. Or ...
A 3, 4 or 5 year hardware cycle is perfectly reasonable, unless the software/operating systems gets so slow and bloated that performance suffers. Or unless the vendor stops supporting the software or operating system and their is no way to get third party or home grown support. So, MS-enforced hardware upgrades are definitely not green.
Anyway, the blog (it's not a real article) is way off base about energy consumption. Shame on /. for pushing MS' hype.
MS' coding practices make the company un-ecological: As the blog points out, currently, most MS machines get left on 24/7 (or as close to that as possible) to allow crackers to get in -- I mean to allow the system administrators to push out patches on "patch tuesday" or whatever it's called now.
Turning the machines off would also make them invulnerable to exploits, at least for the duration of the inactive period. Wake-on-LAN is an underutilized feature and could allow that. But it has nothing to do with any specific operating system.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Microsoft is just one line away from becoming the greenest company on earth:
RGB(0,256,0)
It's like green, but it's "one more" than green. It's the greenest.
I haven't seen an app this green since I switched from AS/400.
Please note that while sarcastic, I am happy that the mass market blindly following the trend help fund the R&D effort to produce the better computer I need to run my computer-vision programs...
[Linux zealotery] You can surf the web, play divx, mp3, program and write emails using Linux on an "old" (maybe 3 years) configuration. They are less powerful but generaly use less power. Needing a PIV 3 GHz Dual Core with 2 Go RAM and a graphic card with more memory than I have in my file server for reading emails and DVDs is the real waste, Microsoft is only somehow compensating for this.[/Linux zealotery]
[mod me insightful] Linux is not produce by a company but by individuals on their free time, we can't give its "green rank". But if we want to compare this network of people to a company like Microsoft you have to consier some things :
People in large companies tend to use more resources than people on their free time, be it paper, power, AC, better computers, etc...
The "Linux network" only has programmers. No marketing department, no administration, no financial department, etc... each one of these producing their own wastes
Linux is often used to "recycle" old PCs into education tools or simple media boxes. Do do that with, say, Win 95, you would have (in theory) to 1) find a licence 2) forget about internet connectivity because of all the nasty stuff Win 95 is vulnerable about 3) forget about recent software, even those which are lightweight.[/mod me insightful]
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
Ever hear of remote wake-up or ACPI? Even a Win98 box can be nudged out of Standby mode remotely. The network doesn't have to be fully operational 24 hours a day to receive updates and maintenance, and I doubt you're doing those updates and software installations every single night. If you are, you desperately need to rework your system because it's hanging on to life by a thread. I'm not talking about putting the computers involved in real-time processes, web servers, etc in sleep mode. That wouldn't make a lot of sense. But the dozens or hundreds of workstations the typical customer service department, the mail-room, and all the other clerical and administrative roles a large corporation has are completely unused after the employees leave and none of them except the management would ever have a need for logging in remotely. Not to mention in most of the offices I've worked in that had a Windows platform, usually NT 4 or 2000, all of the updates were run as a batch script when you first logged in. It required all of 5 minutes to complete and it gave you an excuse to go pour a cup of coffee on company time. And on a more cynical note, at least if the WSs were shutdown overnight that'd be 12+ virus- and crash-free hours not to have to worry about.
brandelf: invalid ELF type 'KEEBLER'
Hmm. It seems that the thriving ecosystem of spyware, viruses, worms and trojans is also the direct result of MS' coding practices. Or perhaps to be more precise because of fundamental design flaws in the product. Either way, the problem is not the user, but the vendor.
But that does bring up a very important second point. The "re-format and re-install" mantra has the effect of reducing competition because of the difficulty in auto-installing third-party software on MS-Windows. Unlike Red Hat's kick start or Debian's APT, the third party apps have to wait until they can be installed manually. In that case, especially for large scale sites, the IT dept decides it's too much work to go for best of breed and knuckle under to convenience. Even if they do go with third party apps, time limitations (lunch, meetings, end of shift, project deadlines, etc.) may intervene and prevent completion of installation of the third party apps. With 10's or 100's of millions of PC's, just shifting the frequency a small amount means large numbers of units.
Using a system which is not prone to spyware, viruses, worms or trojans and does well with low system requirements is also an option for many. Power users and hard core gamers may have trouble. Some, a surprisingly small number, of business apps may cause trouble. But low-tech users who just surf or e-mail or play music will do just fine and may not notice.
So there are three choices there:
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
I've just turned powersave features to ma
Deleted
A while back I bought a laser printer. It had a suspiciously good bang for the buck considering that it could do double sided printing. The box said "Optimized for Windows" on it. No problem, a printer is a printer is a printer. Plug it in, fire text at it, and the text winds up on the paper. Fire a few special character sequences at it, and graphics come out. So what if it has drivers that make that process especially efficient in Windows. Anyways, I brought it home, set it up, tried to get my Linux box to print to it, and failed. I tried redirecting text to /dev/lp0 without success. I rebooted the machine into DOS and tried printing from there. No dice. Yet the printer's status pages would come out no problem. A few hours of Googling educated me on a new class of abominations - "winprinters". Mindless zombie hunks of metal and plastic that cannot perform their designated function unless Microsoft Windows is pulling their strings and laughing maniacally. Sorry, no drivers for Macs, or Linux. Windows only.
I brought this abomination back to the store. They were going to refuse to take it back, because I had unsealed the toner cartridge. I pointed out that the box said "Optimized for Windows", not "Exclusively for Windows", or "Must be slaved to a Windows machine, because it isn't really a printer". Fortunately, there was a nice Samsung printer with Tux emblazoned on the side (along with the Apple and Microsoft logos) that was the same price, and the sales guy let me swap. Otherwise I would have been stuck with a $1200 paperweight.
Microsoft may not be a monopoly in the strictest sense of the word, but they are a monsterous company that wields enough power that other companies are willing to lie to, and cheat, their own customers just so they can put the magic word "Windows" on their box.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
I agree that originally, this was tainted money, in the ways Microsoft originally made it, but I don't think the Gates foundation is a front for more manipulation. I think this really is from his heart, maybe with an occasional nudge from Melinda.
2 9/k.CC2B/Home.htm
If Bill Gates was just milking his donations for maximum publicity or leverage, would he have picked the causes he has? He could focus totally on those medical causes that matter most to the industrialized world, for example. He could avoid all the more politically controversial causes out there. When it comes to willingness to let the chips fall where they may, I'd say the Gates Foundation compares favorably to two of the biggest alternatives, the MacArthur and Ford Foundations:
http://www.macfound.org/site/c.lkLXJ8MQKrH/b.8552
http://www.fordfound.org/
(Info on both the Ford Foundation's Sexuality and Religion divisions, and the MacArthur Foundation's Copyright law related work is accessable through these links. The latter may be of special interest to many Slashdotters. Both programs are examples of a foundation not shying away from doing what it thinks is right for fear of alienating business partners, funding sources or sections of the general public.)
Mr. Gates could increase giving to Europe, where Microsoft has had the most trouble, and he could focus on causes that are likely to be dear to the very politicians that have pushed hardest for fines. He doesn't appear to be doing this.
Bill Gates could also just about ignore Africa, or at least give a much smaller percentage of totals there, and still reap the same sort of publicity. Instead of his saying that computers aren't what's needed first in developing nations, he could encourage someone else to pay for more hardware everywhere, just so he could 'give' away lots of software and count that in press releases as donations worth the full retail value, even though it would actually cost him very little. His whole computer initiative goes exactly the other way. The Gates foundation only pushes computerization in areas developed enough to have libraries and similar locations, and actively avoids treating computerization as a solution where basic infrastructure such as reliable food sources, roads or water filtration are more pressing needs. They also avoid pushing computerization where political stability is suspect or obviously lacking. They don't support 'computer in every classroom' or 'every student's home' type programs, and they do pay for both machines and networking, including some pretty long haul wiring runs.
Who is John Cabal?