Subj : Microsoft is changing Windows 11 to help you save money on power
To   : All
From : TechnologyDaily
Date : Fri Mar 31 2023 12:15:04

Microsoft is changing Windows 11 to help you save money on power bills

Date:
Fri, 31 Mar 2023 11:01:08 +0000

Description:
A new preview build also brings in a change for widgets that youll either 
love or hate.

FULL STORY
======================================================================

 Windows 11 has received another preview build in the Dev channel, and it 
brings in a number of tweaks and additions, including beefing up a feature 
that should help your PC use a bit less electricity. 

That would be Content Adaptive Brightness Control (CABC), which as of preview 
build 23424, works not just with laptops on battery power, but when theyre 
plugged in  and indeed with desktop PCs too. 

What CABC does is intelligently dim (or lighten) certain parts of the screen 
depending on what content is being displayed, the idea being that it can cut 
back power usage without hampering the visual experience. 

In other words, the tweaking on the dimming front shouldnt make any 
noticeable difference to the image youre looking at on-screen, and it should 
save you a bit of power (and therefore cash, over time). 

The feature can be set to be always on, or it can be disabled, or 
alternatively you can choose to have CABC kick in only if youre on battery 
power (on a laptop of course). (Image credit: Microsoft) 

What else is new for build 23424? Theres a new widget board which is now 
bigger, so its three columns wide (rather than two) and much roomier 
(assuming the devices screen has enough real-estate to cope). 

Along with this, theres the usual gamut of fixes and minor tweaks, all of 
which are detailed in the usual blog post published with every preview build. 

Notable pieces of minor tinkering include improving the speed of running 
searches within the Settings panel, and a change to produce better 
performance when playing games with a high polling mouse (a super-precise 
fancy gaming mouse , basically). Analysis: Small savings that could add up 
(we hope) 

Bringing adaptive brightness control to a desktop PC might sound a bit daft, 
considering its really more a battery-saving feature for laptops. But if like 
us, you have your PC turned on for about 60 or 70 hours a week, tiny little 
power savings will add up across the year  especially with energy pricing 
being what it is these days (sky-high where we are). 

So, this is a useful addition we think, providing that as Microsoft asserts, 
theres no noticeable hampering of the quality of the monitor image when the 
feature is turned on. Of course, you dont have to switch it on if you dont 
want to. 

Microsofts work with widgets seems to be progressing at a speedy pace, too. 
The more expansive widget board was previously seen in limited testing in the 
Canary channel, which is the earliest test channel, just a week ago . Now its 
already in the Dev channel and more widely rolled out. 

There are other widget-related changes theoretically in the pipeline that we 
might see soon, too. That includes Microsofts experiments with animated icons 
for widgets (which we have to say look quite nifty), and the rumored 
possibility has been floated that users may eventually be allowed to drop 
widgets onto the desktop . It seems fairly clear that widgets are quite a big 
thing for Microsoft, so expect to see more of them in Windows 11 down the 
line.



======================================================================
Link to news story:
https://www.techradar.com/news/microsoft-is-changing-windows-11-to-help-you-sa
ve-money-on-power-bills


--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 (Linux/64)
 * Origin: tqwNet Technology News (1337:1/100)

.