Windows 7 Saves on Schools Electricity Costs
With the arrival of Microsoft’s latest operating system Windows 7 they say that they can save schools hundreds of thousands of pounds each year in electric bills.
Although there are school budgets perhaps this is one area that is often overlooked for power saving although most school policies will have you turn off unwanted lights in the evening and ensure that they have a good heating system that is properly maintained.
However, in recent years with heavy investment into ICT labs within schools by the current government the volume of desktop computers has mushroomed and these terminals, servers and desktops consume a lot of electric power in primary and secondary schools in England, Scotland and Wales. It’s difficult for teachers to ask pupils to turn off the computers when the lessons finish as it takes a lot of time and effort to reboot everything for the next lesson so most will have their entire ICT powered up for the full day.
So step in Windows 7 which has many power saving features built in.
Before the official launch Microsoft pre-launched the new operating system in around 12 schools in the UK to not only take advantage of group volume pricing discounts but the built in power saving technologies.
In the previous days of XP a teacher (or their pupils) would have to turn each machine off individually but now there can be a central terminal that manages up to 300 linked machines via a new management console so a system administrator can not only manage what people are doing but make system wide changes that can power save at one key stroke.
Microsoft estimate that just by having these new built in features that an average secondary school can save around £10,000 per year on its electricity costs. And it doesn’t end there.
Because of the structure of the software and management some schools can actually reduce the number of servers running their system so there are less machines eating up expensive electric power. One example sited by Microsoft was a school in Wiltshire that managed to cut the number of physical servers from 11 to 3 and had 10 running as virtual terminals and this school has managed to cut its electricity bills by £18,000 per year. There are other savings as well because this school didn’t need to purchase new servers to run their systems.
This is great news for schools because with that saving of £18,000 just on electricity alone will pay for one new teacher per year which is money better spent. Of course all schools have the option to change supplier and negotiate better deals with some of the big 6 business energy suppliers but like with other businesses they may be tied into long term contracts that are difficult to get out of.
The Windows 7 operating system has been one of the best received Microsoft operating systems in recent years because it is more simple to use and with these additional aggressive power saving options can save not only schools but any business or home based person thousands per year in a cost which can then be used for better purposes.
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