Does disabling devices in device manager save power?

My HP laptop had a Wireless Manager that lets me turn on/off wifi, bluetooth, and WWAN. For some odd reason, the Wireless manager program doesn't start anymore, I probably uninstalled some support library and thus killed off the ability for HP to run hp-based programs but I don't really care (tried reinstalling same problem). I took out the WWAN card because it wouldn't stay off so I don't think im wasting too much power.

But I rarely use bluetooth and I don't seem to have control of it to turn on and off. If I just disable/enable it when I need it from the device manager rather than the utility will I be saving power?

Actually, this makes me wonder about the idle current for a lot of un-used parts in the laptop and if it would be beneficial to disable it in terms of battery life.

I know 500mA isn't much per device but seems wasteful anyways.

 

I know that disabling some unused USB ports will save some battery life.

 

I would think that disabling bluetooth would save a bit of power.

 

The power saved is minuscule compared to the biggest power drains in a notebook (CPU/fan, HD, and the display)

Personally, the best way to conserve power in newer notebooks is throttle the CPU and limit the amount of resources the notebook needs on idle. If you're idling on 20-30% CPU usage, your fan will constantly be blowing to keep the CPU cool thus killing any hope of decent battery life.

 

Yeah, I know hard drive and CPU use is probably dominant.

But its just, leave the things running or turn them off and hopefully save the 0.10watt idle power

I suppose a really good way to save power is get rid of vista (or at least reinstall it) because I have a very annoying CPU spike issue but thats for another post (happened 3 times during the typing of this entry)

 

The most power consumed by a laptop in my opinion are the screen, bluetooth, and Wireless, you can't disable the screen so let go off the bluetooth always unless when u need it. and WAN only when u need it

 

i wouldnt uninstall vista quite yet... i'd wait for SP1 and see if that makes a difference on the power consumption...

 

You will save power by turning off the wireless and blue tooth (transmitting takes a lot of power). IDK about the USB ports, though, seems they'd only represent a significant load if they were sending power to something like an external drive.

 

If you don't need something, you can turn it off, but bluetooth uses almost NO power, contrary to others comments. WiFi DOES use a lot of power in comparison, so turn that off if you can. Anything else you probably will spend more electricity clicking through the menus to turn them on and off than you will save by doing so.

The big consumers are:
- CPU
- LCD Screen
- Optical disk
- Hard disk
- Fans

Compare that a bluetooth headset for your cell phone has a battery the size of a few nickels, and lasts for hours in use. That not a lot of juice. But if you turn on Wifi on your iphone, you can practically watch the battery meter go down.

 

Hmm yeah, I was mostly trying to get at how to turn it off, like will it actually be off when its disabled in the task manager.

Yeah, Vista SP1 RC1 is doing pretty good. I just happen to have found a lot of bugs thats all.

 

My answer is yes, but it's always best to disable stuff from BIOS (if possible), since they will surely not be (get) initialized.