How Windows Vista Works - Windows Vista Cool New Features & API’s - Part IV - The new "Sleep" power state

Posted on March 13, 2007 at 2:29 pm

Make sure to read other posts from the Windows Vista Cool Features series!

How Windows Vista Works - Windows Vista Cool New Features & API’s - Part I - Restart Manager API
How Windows Vista Works - Windows Vista Cool New Features & API’s - Part II - You can run Vista in a Virtual PC on the same computer for free!
How Windows Vista Works - Windows Vista Cool New Features & API’s - Part III - Windows DreamScene
How Windows Vista Works - Windows Vista Cool New Features & API’s - Part IV - The new "Sleep" power state
How Windows Vista Works - Windows Vista Cool New Features & API’s - Part V - Windows Anytime Upgrade
How Windows Vista Works - Windows Vista Cool New Features & API’s - Part VI - Windows Meeting Space

Raise your hand if you used Hibernation in the Windows XP! It was always a really nice feature, but just too much hassle to actually worry about doing it. It was so much easier to just slam the lid shut and your computer would just go into StandBy without having to make 3 clicks of the mouse! It’s kinda sad to say that, but 3 clicks is a lot of clicks if you’re dying to get home after work!

So no more StandBy and Hibernate to worry about! In Windows Vista, the default mode for your computer when you close of the lid or press the power button on your computer will be the new “Sleep” mode. It basically takes the benefits of both StandBy and Hibernation and combines them into one.

The advantage of StandBy was that your Windows session was store in the computer’s memory (RAM) and so it could jump back to life very quickly. However, if you didn’t plug in the computer for too long, the battery would die and you would lose your session. The advantage of hibernation was that even if your computer battery died, when you turned on your computer the next time it would load up the session from the hard disk instead of memory. But this would take a lot more time than StandBy.

The new sleep mode now writes your Windows session to both memory and the hard drive, so that as long as your computer has power, you can load up quickly from memory, but in case it dies, then it’ll load up from the hard drive. However, in order to get all of these benefits you’ll need to buy a new PC with Vista installed because the feature requires the hardware to support the newest ACPI (Advanced Configuration and Power Interface) instructions.

So if you’re planning on buying a new computer, you’ll get to enjoy the benefits of the new Sleep mode!

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» Filed Under Windows Vista