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    macbook lid closed - comparible to windows sleep or hibernate?

    Discussion in 'Apple and Mac OS X' started by passive101, Apr 6, 2007.

  1. passive101

    passive101 Notebook Deity

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    What does the macbook do when it is running and you close the lid? does it store it in RAM and use very little power like the sleep function of a windows laptop or does it store stuff on the HD and use no power like the hibernate feature of windows?

    Just curious which it is closer to.
     
    passive101, Apr 6, 2007
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  2. G-Force

    G-Force Notebook Consultant

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    It stores the session in the memory and keeps the memory powered. So it's not comparable to the Hibernate function in Windows. :)
     
    G-Force, Apr 6, 2007
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  3. passive101

    passive101 Notebook Deity

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    I noticed when my macbook is in sleep and when my g/f's acer 5100 is in sleep the macbook uses about 1/2 the power only. (this was an 8 hr test)

    the macbook went down 6% while the acer went down 11%
     
    passive101, Apr 6, 2007
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  4. l33t_c0w

    l33t_c0w Notebook Deity

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    It's comparable to both.

    It keeps the seesion in memory, and sticks it on the drive as well. Try shutting it, waiting a bit, removing your battery, waiting a bit, then putting the battery back and pushing the power button. It'll take a little longer to start back up (and will give you a neat gray loading screen), but everything will be there.
     
    l33t_c0w, Apr 6, 2007
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  5. orthorim

    orthorim Notebook Evangelist

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    it used to be like windows suspend mode except that for some reason Macs hardly use any power in this mode. Windows is getting better but like you observed still uses a lot more than Macs. I could keep my Mac in sleep mode for 2 weeks.

    New Macs also store the session to HD at the same time. So if you do run out of battery - or if the battery goes below some threshold, not sure which - it will recover from HD, just like windows hibernate.

    the main difference to both hibernate and suspend: this actually works reliably on the Mac. wake from sleep takes 1 second or less.

    on Windows it more or less works - again, seems to get better - but sometimes screws up and you have to restart. on my win system, frequently some things won't work anymore after waking from sleep - and hibernate has a higher error rate so I don't even use that anymore.
     
    orthorim, Apr 7, 2007
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  6. Underpantman

    Underpantman Notebook Virtuoso

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    I agree the main difference is that sleep works on mac, but is more of a hassle on the pc. This is still true for vista. The battery life on the mac will last days/weeks in sleep mode, but I am lucky to get 10h out of my hp running vista.
    a
    :)
     
    Underpantman, Apr 7, 2007
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