Computers On Overnight?

Those of you who have been in a computer room on campus anytime in the evening will probably have been struck that all the computers are on even when no-one is in the room - B23 Llandinam, Penbryn, PJM - even the Hugh Owen library computers are still lit up when the room is dark!

Colossal waste of energy? You bet.
(I haven't counted myself, but I think that's 677 PCs)

Last year's E&E office, Alain, was in contact with Information Services about this and after following up this year, this is the situation explained from IS:

- There was a project being undertaken at the University of Wales Institute Cardif for automatic shut-down of public computer workstations in the evening and starting things up in the morning, and IS was following the outcomes of this study.

-However, the system that is used would not work here in Aber as it would be incompatible with the hardware currently used.

-Shutting down systems automatically seemed to work alright, but the difficulty was with starting things up in the morning - called 'Wake on LAN' (WOL) - for morning classes and to deliver system updates.

- I have been told that Information Services is considering a 'refresh' of their systems next summer and that a WOL capability should be an essential requirement in making the choices for replacement equipment at that point.

So, it'll be another year - at least - before we can expect that public computers will be automatically powered down overnight. That is disappointing and it's something that's been thoroughly annoying since my first year - and there'll be much more wasteful carbon emissions along the way with the amount of electricity used - but at least there may be light at the end of the tunnel.