Sleep Mode

[Brian Matthews]

I just discovered how good Windows 7 works when going into sleep mode
and then waking up.

But I have a question. The first time I tried the sleep mode, all my
fans stayed on. I can go into the BIOS and have them shut down during
sleep mode but I'm not sure if this is safe or not. Does heat build up
while the PC is in sleep mode? There is an option in my BIOS that
allows me to have an alarm when the CPU gets too hot. Will the fan
come on in sleep mode if heat builds up? As you can see, the sleep
mode is all new to me. But I LOVE the way the PC wakes up so quickly,
a matter of 2 or 3 seconds! Thanks in advance for any/all help.

Brian

 

[Wolf K]

I just discovered how good Windows 7 works when going into sleep mode
and then waking up.

But I have a question. The first time I tried the sleep mode, all my
fans stayed on. I can go into the BIOS and have them shut down during
sleep mode but I'm not sure if this is safe or not. Does heat build up
while the PC is in sleep mode? There is an option in my BIOS that
allows me to have an alarm when the CPU gets too hot. Will the fan
come on in sleep mode if heat builds up? As you can see, the sleep
mode is all new to me. But I LOVE the way the PC wakes up so quickly,
a matter of 2 or 3 seconds! Thanks in advance for any/all help.

Brian

Let the BIOS turn them off. "Sleep" means minimal electricity flow -->
minimal heat.

AFAIK, all current BIOS will turn on the fans when the temperature rises
about a preset value. You may be able to bump up the temperature a few
degrees, depending on how much free air space there is around your
machine. "Hot to the hands", or about 45-50 degrees Celsius, is safe for
electronic components. (Sorry, I can't recall where I came across that
nugget).

FWIW, I've removed the side panel from my box here, as we have very
little dust in the house. The fans hardly ever come on. I've not had to
clean the innards in over a year (though I should do so real Soon Now ;-) ).

HTH
Wolf K.

 

[Brian Matthews]

Let the BIOS turn them off. "Sleep" means minimal electricity flow -->
minimal heat.

AFAIK, all current BIOS will turn on the fans when the temperature rises
about a preset value. You may be able to bump up the temperature a few
degrees, depending on how much free air space there is around your
machine. "Hot to the hands", or about 45-50 degrees Celsius, is safe for
electronic components. (Sorry, I can't recall where I came across that
nugget).

FWIW, I've removed the side panel from my box here, as we have very
little dust in the house. The fans hardly ever come on. I've not had to
clean the innards in over a year (though I should do so real Soon Now ;-) ).

HTH
Wolf K.

Thanks for the info. Google didn't help much. : (

Yes, my BIOS has options for "warnings" when the heat rises. I set it
to the lowest heat setting.

So, in sleep mode, the fans will turn on if heat rises?

Brian

 

[Paul]

I just discovered how good Windows 7 works when going into sleep mode
and then waking up.

But I have a question. The first time I tried the sleep mode, all my
fans stayed on. I can go into the BIOS and have them shut down during
sleep mode but I'm not sure if this is safe or not. Does heat build up
while the PC is in sleep mode? There is an option in my BIOS that
allows me to have an alarm when the CPU gets too hot. Will the fan
come on in sleep mode if heat builds up? As you can see, the sleep
mode is all new to me. But I LOVE the way the PC wakes up so quickly,
a matter of 2 or 3 seconds! Thanks in advance for any/all help.

Brian

There are two kinds of sleep.

* Standby S1
* S3 Suspend To RAM

If you hear fans, you might still be in S1.

In S3 state, the computer shuts off the main rails of the
ATX supply output. The 3.3V, 5V, 12V are turned off. The
+5VSB remains running and helps maintain the RAM contents.
But the fans, the CPU, the hard drives on a desktop, they
use +12V, and once the power goes off, you hear the fans
go off at the same time. Even the ATX cooling fan goes
off, when the main rails are turned off. The ATX cooling
fan is not needed, to cool the supply when it makes +5VSB
(10W to 15W total output, typically 5W to 10W used).

*******

Modern Intel and AMD processors, have overheat protection in the
form of the THERMTRIP signal. That allows the ATX supply to be
turned off, if the CPU gets too hot. So you do have some level
of protection.

Paul

 

[Brian Matthews]

There are two kinds of sleep.

* Standby S1
* S3 Suspend To RAM

If you hear fans, you might still be in S1.

In S3 state, the computer shuts off the main rails of the
ATX supply output. The 3.3V, 5V, 12V are turned off. The
+5VSB remains running and helps maintain the RAM contents.
But the fans, the CPU, the hard drives on a desktop, they
use +12V, and once the power goes off, you hear the fans
go off at the same time. Even the ATX cooling fan goes
off, when the main rails are turned off. The ATX cooling
fan is not needed, to cool the supply when it makes +5VSB
(10W to 15W total output, typically 5W to 10W used).

*******

Modern Intel and AMD processors, have overheat protection in the
form of the THERMTRIP signal. That allows the ATX supply to be
turned off, if the CPU gets too hot. So you do have some level
of protection.

Paul

So....no fans are needed for the dedicated Video Card or other
components? My AMD chip should have the signal but I never saw it in
the BIOS. Does it need to be turned on? And hopefully, it shuts the PC
down. I was told once that if a fan fails on your chipset, it would
fry in under a minute. That's why it gets me nervous to be letting
fans stop.

I'm going to do a study with SIW (System Information for Windows).
It gives a ton of specs on your system, even the vendor names of
installed components. They also have temperatures for just about
everything in your system.

Brian

 

[Paul]

So....no fans are needed for the dedicated Video Card or other
components? My AMD chip should have the signal but I never saw it in
the BIOS. Does it need to be turned on? And hopefully, it shuts the PC
down. I was told once that if a fan fails on your chipset, it would
fry in under a minute. That's why it gets me nervous to be letting
fans stop.

I'm going to do a study with SIW (System Information for Windows).
It gives a ton of specs on your system, even the vendor names of
installed components. They also have temperatures for just about
everything in your system.

Brian

The overheat protection is specifically for the CPU. If the
CPU gets hot enough, there is a signal from the CPU to the
chipset. And the chipset controls PS_ON#. THERMTRIP turns off
PS_ON# which turns off the ATX power supply (soft off). That
stops the CPU from overheating.

Generally, other heat sources are not protected in a similar way.
You're right, in that the motherboard chipset fan can fail, without
any warning (some of them, don't have RPM measurement, they're
too cheap for that). Or a video card fan can fail, stop turning,
and then the fan body melts when the heat from the GPU gets it.

I'm not sure what settings you have in the BIOS. Some pre-built
computers (like an HP), have PWM speed control on up to three
fan channels. Which allows the motherboard and appropriate software,
to turn down any fan if things are cool enough. Some SuperI/O chips
even have a "cruise control" for their fans, such that the SuperI/O
checks the temps, and sets the fan itself. And that can be configured
by the BIOS at power up, leaving Windows totally oblivious to what
is going on.

But turning down a fan, should not intentionally leave it off for
long periods of time. Eventually, heat buildup requires the fan to
come back on, as the fan and heatsink tend to insulate things if there
is no moving air.

*******

If you want to fool around with "S" states, you should get a copy of "dumppo"
for Windows. It's a command line tool. Instructions on usage are here.

http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=1825058&postcount=31

The dumppo program is only around 12KB, so it's a small download.
And that's because it doesn't have a GUI, and presents things
with text. Still, it's better than nothing (like visiting 200 different
registry settings yourself).

Specifically, you'd want S3 to be enabled in the BIOS, and make sure
dumppo is indicating your system can do S3 as well.

Of my systems here, only one had trouble with S3 sleep. About one time in four,
on restoring from sleep, the system would crash. I run that one in hibernate (S4)
if I need to save the session, and hibernate works 100% on that system. It doesn't
seem to be bad RAM, because under all the tests I can devise, the memory
is excellent (it has a lower error rate than my previous PC3200 systems).
That one seems to be a VIA chipset issue of some sort.

Paul

 

[Brian Matthews]

The overheat protection is specifically for the CPU. If the
CPU gets hot enough, there is a signal from the CPU to the
chipset. And the chipset controls PS_ON#. THERMTRIP turns off
PS_ON# which turns off the ATX power supply (soft off). That
stops the CPU from overheating.

Generally, other heat sources are not protected in a similar way.
You're right, in that the motherboard chipset fan can fail, without
any warning (some of them, don't have RPM measurement, they're
too cheap for that). Or a video card fan can fail, stop turning,
and then the fan body melts when the heat from the GPU gets it.

I'm not sure what settings you have in the BIOS. Some pre-built
computers (like an HP), have PWM speed control on up to three
fan channels. Which allows the motherboard and appropriate software,
to turn down any fan if things are cool enough. Some SuperI/O chips
even have a "cruise control" for their fans, such that the SuperI/O
checks the temps, and sets the fan itself. And that can be configured
by the BIOS at power up, leaving Windows totally oblivious to what
is going on.

But turning down a fan, should not intentionally leave it off for
long periods of time. Eventually, heat buildup requires the fan to
come back on, as the fan and heatsink tend to insulate things if there
is no moving air.

*******

If you want to fool around with "S" states, you should get a copy of "dumppo"
for Windows. It's a command line tool. Instructions on usage are here.

http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=1825058&postcount=31

The dumppo program is only around 12KB, so it's a small download.
And that's because it doesn't have a GUI, and presents things
with text. Still, it's better than nothing (like visiting 200 different
registry settings yourself).

Specifically, you'd want S3 to be enabled in the BIOS, and make sure
dumppo is indicating your system can do S3 as well.

Of my systems here, only one had trouble with S3 sleep. About one time in four,
on restoring from sleep, the system would crash. I run that one in hibernate (S4)
if I need to save the session, and hibernate works 100% on that system. It doesn't
seem to be bad RAM, because under all the tests I can devise, the memory
is excellent (it has a lower error rate than my previous PC3200 systems).
That one seems to be a VIA chipset issue of some sort.

Paul

Thanks for the help, Paul.
This is how far I have it figured out;

When I go into my BIOS, the only name I see it called is;

"Award Modular BIOS v6.00PC.
AMD 870 BIOS for GA-870A-UD3-F4"

My CPU is an AMD Phenom II X6 1100T Processor 3.30GHz.

My BIOS gives me several different pages to go into.

In the "Power Management Setup" menu, this is what I see;

ACPI Suspend Time [S3 (STR)}

So, I believe I have my system setup to use S3 sleep.

There's also something called ErP Support. It's disabled. The
description states that disabled means "Default Power Consumption".
Enabled means "<1W Standby (S5) NO WOL"

(I have NO idea what NO WOL means)

Now I'm trying to figure out how to make my system go into S3 sleep
mode. When I change the power options, it only goes into S1 mode and
the fans stay on.
I can change it to S3 by the key on the keyboard or by clicking the
shutdown button arrow. Sleep is an option, along with restart, logoff,
switch user and lock.

So how can I get my PC to automatically go into S3 mode with the fans
off?

I changed the CPU warning Temperature in the BIOS from disabled to
60(C)/140(C).
That's as low as it goes without disabling it. Does my CPU have this
"THERMTRIP" protection?

 

[Paul]

The overheat protection is specifically for the CPU. If the
CPU gets hot enough, there is a signal from the CPU to the
chipset. And the chipset controls PS_ON#. THERMTRIP turns off
PS_ON# which turns off the ATX power supply (soft off). That
stops the CPU from overheating.

Generally, other heat sources are not protected in a similar way.
You're right, in that the motherboard chipset fan can fail, without
any warning (some of them, don't have RPM measurement, they're
too cheap for that). Or a video card fan can fail, stop turning,
and then the fan body melts when the heat from the GPU gets it.

I'm not sure what settings you have in the BIOS. Some pre-built
computers (like an HP), have PWM speed control on up to three
fan channels. Which allows the motherboard and appropriate software,
to turn down any fan if things are cool enough. Some SuperI/O chips
even have a "cruise control" for their fans, such that the SuperI/O
checks the temps, and sets the fan itself. And that can be configured
by the BIOS at power up, leaving Windows totally oblivious to what
is going on.

But turning down a fan, should not intentionally leave it off for
long periods of time. Eventually, heat buildup requires the fan to
come back on, as the fan and heatsink tend to insulate things if there
is no moving air.

*******

If you want to fool around with "S" states, you should get a copy of "dumppo"
for Windows. It's a command line tool. Instructions on usage are here.

http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=1825058&postcount=31

The dumppo program is only around 12KB, so it's a small download.
And that's because it doesn't have a GUI, and presents things
with text. Still, it's better than nothing (like visiting 200 different
registry settings yourself).

Specifically, you'd want S3 to be enabled in the BIOS, and make sure
dumppo is indicating your system can do S3 as well.

Of my systems here, only one had trouble with S3 sleep. About one time in four,
on restoring from sleep, the system would crash. I run that one in hibernate (S4)
if I need to save the session, and hibernate works 100% on that system. It doesn't
seem to be bad RAM, because under all the tests I can devise, the memory
is excellent (it has a lower error rate than my previous PC3200 systems).
That one seems to be a VIA chipset issue of some sort.

Paul

Thanks for the help, Paul.
This is how far I have it figured out;

When I go into my BIOS, the only name I see it called is;

"Award Modular BIOS v6.00PC.
AMD 870 BIOS for GA-870A-UD3-F4"

My CPU is an AMD Phenom II X6 1100T Processor 3.30GHz.

My BIOS gives me several different pages to go into.

In the "Power Management Setup" menu, this is what I see;

ACPI Suspend Time [S3 (STR)}

So, I believe I have my system setup to use S3 sleep.

There's also something called ErP Support. It's disabled. The
description states that disabled means "Default Power Consumption".
Enabled means "<1W Standby (S5) NO WOL"

(I have NO idea what NO WOL means)

Now I'm trying to figure out how to make my system go into S3 sleep
mode. When I change the power options, it only goes into S1 mode and
the fans stay on.
I can change it to S3 by the key on the keyboard or by clicking the
shutdown button arrow. Sleep is an option, along with restart, logoff,
switch user and lock.

So how can I get my PC to automatically go into S3 mode with the fans
off?

I changed the CPU warning Temperature in the BIOS from disabled to
60(C)/140(C).
That's as low as it goes without disabling it. Does my CPU have this
"THERMTRIP" protection?

I can try and explain the hardware things. I'm not sure I can help
with the sleep all that much.

S3 STR is Suspend To RAM. So that's the one you want for an ACPI BIOS option.

ErP is a standard for reduced power consumption when a computer
isn't being used. Motherboards have been made "ready" for the standard,
but it may not be implemented fully at this time. "NO WOL" means
no wake on LAN enabled. For Wake On LAN to work, the Ethernet chip
must be powered. And to meet a 1 watt wasted electricity standard,
they have to dispense with features like that. With WOL, you can be
sitting at another computer, send a packet to the computer in question,
and wake it up. If that computer was in ErP, hardly any of its hardware
is powered. And thus WOL doesn't work.

With regard to sleep, all I can suggest is using "dumppo" to
restrict the allowed modes in such a way, that only S3 is supported
and not S1. I didn't think there was a control for selecting
S1 versus S3 in one of the Control Panels, but you never know,
perhaps someone else has seen that somewhere.

Paul

 

[Brian Matthews]

ErP is a standard for reduced power consumption when a computer
isn't being used. Motherboards have been made "ready" for the standard,
but it may not be implemented fully at this time.

Just like my BIOS has the option to boot from USB.
But Micro$oft won't allow you to do that. But I guess you can boot
from Linux from USB.

Brian

 

[Char Jackson]

Just like my BIOS has the option to boot from USB.
But Micro$oft won't allow you to do that. But I guess you can boot
from Linux from USB.

Say what? I've been booting XP and Win 7 systems from a USB thumb
drive for a long time. What problems are you having?

 

[Paul]

Just like my BIOS has the option to boot from USB.
But Micro$oft won't allow you to do that. But I guess you can boot
from Linux from USB.

Brian

There is a hack for WinXP at least, to allow booting from USB.

Try a search on:

winxp BootBusExtenders

Basically, the modification causes the USB bus to be detected
early, such that the bus isn't disconnected half way through
the boot process.

I tried booting Win7 here from USB, and it didn't work. I
haven't had a strong reason to investigate further, whether
a similar hack works for Win7.

Paul

 

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

Say what? I've been booting XP and Win 7 systems from a USB thumb
drive for a long time. What problems are you having?

Hang on, are you booting & running Windows XP and/or Windows 7 from a
USB thumb drive, or are you just booting a system that has Win XP/7
using a USB thumb drive with a different OS?

Just curious, since from what I can tell Windows doesn't treat USB
mass storage devices the same way it does other mass storage devices
and resets them during boot, interrupting the boot process with a 7F
stop error. If you've gotten around this, I'd be interested in
hearing how...

 

[Char Jackson]

Hang on, are you booting & running Windows XP and/or Windows 7 from a
USB thumb drive, or are you just booting a system that has Win XP/7
using a USB thumb drive with a different OS?

Hmm, good point. I'm doing your second scenario. My thumb drive has a
non-Windows OS that I've packed full of computer repair tools. I see
now, I think, that you guys are talking about booting and running
Windows from a USB drive, which I haven't tried. Sorry.

 

[Brian Matthews]

Hang on, are you booting & running Windows XP and/or Windows 7 from a
USB thumb drive, or are you just booting a system that has Win XP/7
using a USB thumb drive with a different OS?

Just curious, since from what I can tell Windows doesn't treat USB
mass storage devices the same way it does other mass storage devices
and resets them during boot, interrupting the boot process with a 7F
stop error. If you've gotten around this, I'd be interested in
hearing how...

Yes, I also got Windows 7 to boot, using a boot UBS stick instead of a
CD. But when I cloned my drive using a UBS enclosure, it errored out.
I then installed the cloned drive in the PC and it booted after doing
the repair bit with the CD. Maybe there's a way to boot into Windows 7
or XP with no HDD in the system, just an enclosure. But I couldn't
figure it out.

I have read that you can boot right into the system using Linux. Not
sure if it's true or not, just something I read.

Brian

 

[Paul]

Yes, I also got Windows 7 to boot, using a boot UBS stick instead of a
CD. But when I cloned my drive using a UBS enclosure, it errored out.
I then installed the cloned drive in the PC and it booted after doing
the repair bit with the CD. Maybe there's a way to boot into Windows 7
or XP with no HDD in the system, just an enclosure. But I couldn't
figure it out.

I have read that you can boot right into the system using Linux. Not
sure if it's true or not, just something I read.

Brian

I have Linux on a USB stick, so yes, it's possible to get at
least one OS to boot immediately. There is a utility with that
distro, which will prepare the USB stick for you.

Windows can be made to boot from USB devices, but it requires the
BootBusExtenders stuff to work. And of course, activation. If the
computer hardware changes (because you moved the USB disk from
one computer to another), then it's going to ask to be
activated again. I've not run into any web pages, discussing
doing this on Win7 yet. And my one attempt, didn't work.

Paul

 

[BillW50]

I have Linux on a USB stick, so yes, it's possible to get at
least one OS to boot immediately. There is a utility with that
distro, which will prepare the USB stick for you.

Windows can be made to boot from USB devices, but it requires the
BootBusExtenders stuff to work. And of course, activation. If the
computer hardware changes (because you moved the USB disk from
one computer to another), then it's going to ask to be
activated again. I've not run into any web pages, discussing
doing this on Win7 yet. And my one attempt, didn't work.

Paul

I too know all of this. But I also noticed at:

Casper hard disk drive copy software
http://www.fssdev.com/products/casper/features.aspx

USB Boot Capability -- creates a fully bootable copy of a Windows system
drive that can boot and run directly from an external USB drive

 

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

Windows can be made to boot from USB devices, but it requires the
BootBusExtenders stuff to work.

The method I've seen for Boot Bus Extenders seemed pretty hackish and
tended to break constantly - any time an update was applied or a USB
drive was detected, it would no longer work and had to be re-hacked.
And you touch on the bigger issue below:

And of course, activation. If the
computer hardware changes (because you moved the USB disk from
one computer to another), then it's going to ask to be
activated again.

Which pretty much defeats the purpose - if it isn't able to boot and
run on any arbitrary hardware platform, then it isn't particularly
useful. Now, if you knew of a way to make it work like the Linux Live
Cd / USB setups where it would detect and run on any supported
hardware, it would be different...

 

[BillW50]

In

The method I've seen for Boot Bus Extenders seemed pretty hackish and
tended to break constantly - any time an update was applied or a USB
drive was detected, it would no longer work and had to be re-hacked.
And you touch on the bigger issue below:


Which pretty much defeats the purpose - if it isn't able to boot and
run on any arbitrary hardware platform, then it isn't particularly
useful. Now, if you knew of a way to make it work like the Linux Live
Cd / USB setups where it would detect and run on any supported
hardware, it would be different...

The Windows Live version is called WinPE. Runs on anything that is
Windows compatible. While I have WinPE 3, I still like BartPE better.
And both Acronis (Restore to dissimilar hardware) and Paragon (Adaptive
Restore) allows you to move Windows from one system to another
completely different system. How they work is by plugging in all generic
drivers once again. And some branded OEM version of Windows doesn't
require any activation. And you can change the hardware as much as you
would like and these versions of Windows just don't care. Of course, you
can't do any of this unless you are legally licensed to do so. Otherwise
this falls into the piracy category. I am not sure if the loophole for
educational purposes applies or not here. As I am not a lawyer.

 

[Yousuf Khan]

I just discovered how good Windows 7 works when going into sleep mode
and then waking up.

But I have a question. The first time I tried the sleep mode, all my
fans stayed on. I can go into the BIOS and have them shut down during
sleep mode but I'm not sure if this is safe or not. Does heat build up
while the PC is in sleep mode? There is an option in my BIOS that
allows me to have an alarm when the CPU gets too hot. Will the fan
come on in sleep mode if heat builds up? As you can see, the sleep
mode is all new to me. But I LOVE the way the PC wakes up so quickly,
a matter of 2 or 3 seconds! Thanks in advance for any/all help.

My computer goes into sleep mode and all fans get turned off. There's no
heat build-up. Modern processors have ultra-low power sleep modes which
requires little power (eg. C1E and C3), almost as good as hibernate, but
much faster to restart. The only real power still flowing to the system
are going to the RAM, which are being refreshed at much lower rates.

Yousuf Khan

 

[Yousuf Khan]

Thanks for the help, Paul.
This is how far I have it figured out;

When I go into my BIOS, the only name I see it called is;

"Award Modular BIOS v6.00PC.
AMD 870 BIOS for GA-870A-UD3-F4"

My CPU is an AMD Phenom II X6 1100T Processor 3.30GHz.

I have the exact same processor, and it is fine running with fanless
sleep mode.

Yousuf Khan