In other news, professional behavioral psychologists teach a new dog old tricks.
http://blogs.mcafee.com/consumer/smartphone-pin-codes
http://www.syssec.rub.de/media/emma/veroeffentlichungen/2014/06/30/GraphNeighbors-Sicherheit14.pdf
Annually I average about 5.5KW a day
Please, do everyone a favor and get your units straight. You probably mean 5.5 KWh. Apart from that small mix-up, thank you for the additional perspective.
Why would you use a power saver and just not turn it off?
Not sure exactly what you're referring to here. I assume you mean to say that "why rely on the increased efficiency of some devices rather than be more aggressive at turning them off". My point is that as we get more and more efficient with a technology (e.g., large displays), the importance of it's energy consumption pales in comparison to other, more power-hungry technologies, like our forced air AC systems, V8 engines, and deep fat fryers ('Murica!!!).
And why do you think appliance aren't also become more energy efficient? Can you just not grasp more than one thing at a time?
They are, but much more slowly than anything computer-related. Take for example, your standard chest freezer or AC unit. How will it take before we double it's energy efficiency? 20 years, probably more? This is in comparison to modern electronics, which tend to double their efficiency roughly every 5 years (correct me if I'm wrong here), even less if you count modern CPUs in the last 10 years. The point is that our appliances are approaching the practical limits of efficiency, yet we let them draw tremendous amounts of energy without batting an eye.
I mean, there is exactly no reason for your rant.
There is exactly no effort put forth on your part to see and understand the reasons for my rant.
1. The comment I replied to stated that consuming power to display images is "pointless". I refuted this by giving an example of a computer in a home office.
2. The comment also implied that utilizing an idle display for *anything* was pointless. Hence, my example of displaying Linux stats and uptime.
3. I was tired of people championing aggressive energy savings in an small area, while many large areas go unobserved.
4. I was tired of people who shove energy efficiency in everyone's faces without considering that most people are perfectly fine with consuming extra energy so long as it improves their quality of life (including, but not limited to, displaying pretty pictures).
I would ask why we still have screen savers
Although it isn't a hard-and-fast rule, screensavers nowadays are less about preventing burn-in and more about utilizing idle displays. For example, on a Linux-based machine, it's not unusual to have screensaver options that let you display the system load and uptime. Photo screensavers are another prime example. If I'm in my home office for an hour at a time, but only using the computer for 10 minutes, why not have my otherwise idle screen act as a large digital photo frame? You are correct in asserting that power consumption is an issue, but display technology has come a long way, so my 24" monitor draws much less power than my 19" CRT. Reducing power usage is a wonderful slogan, but modern society has a very poor grasp on exactly how much power their devices consume compared to their microwave, water heater, air conditioning, dusk-to-dawn lighting, and other amenities. It's great to hear that your cell-phone charger now reduces it's power consumption by 95% when not in use, but do you have any idea how that compares to an running your AC and heat an extra day each fall/spring, microwaving your pre-cooked meal every other night?
"A car is just a big purse on wheels." -- Johanna Reynolds
