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Solaris Common Desktop Environment: User's Guide

Hardware Support for Power Management Features

All SPARC workstations can use some features of the Power Management software. However, some features only work on certain types of hardware. Some default power states vary from one type of system to another.

The following section describes the Power Management features that are supported by your hardware, as well as the defaults that are in effect when you first use this Solaris release with your hardware.

Note –

Intel hardware running the Solaris operating environment does not support Power Management.

Power Management Features on Different Hardware Systems

The Power Management features are enabled by both the power-saving capability of the hardware, and the software provided with the Solaris operating environment. The exact nature of the power-saving mode your system goes into depends on your hardware and the compliance of the hardware with Energy Star. To determine the version of Energy Star to which your system complies, use the prtconf -vp | grep energystar command.

Power Management-capable hardware provides the features discussed in the following sections.

Energy Star 3.0-Compliant Systems

The Energy Star 3.0-compliant SPARCTM hardware reduces power consumption by entering a low-power mode from which devices can resume full operation automatically. This hardware can turn off monitors and frame buffers, spin down disks, and drop the devices' power consumption significantly when they are idle — all while leaving the system up and running, ready for use, and visible on the network. When a job appears on the system, either through a cron process, or an external demand through a network, the devices and other hardware snap back into full-power mode within seconds.

Energy Star 2.0-Compliant Systems

Energy Star 2.0-compliant SPARC hardware does not have the capability of going into a reduced-power mode. Instead, the system completely shuts down after the designated number of minutes of idleness. The exception to this are the monitors, which do have the capability of going into low-power mode and continuing to operate. When you restart, the system takes a minute to reboot.

Systems Noncompliant with Energy Star

Systems that are noncompliant with Energy Star regulations perform power management for only the monitor. Power management is not performed for any other devices.

System Architecture Distinctions and Default Settings

The SPARC architecture of a workstation determines which Power Management features are available. The default behavior in Power Management functions varies on systems, as described in Table 23–1.

To determine your system's architecture, use the uname -m command.

If you have Sun MicrosystemsTM hardware that is not described in this manual, refer to the Sun Hardware Platform Guide for this Solaris release. The Sun Hardware Platform Guide may contain additional information about how Power Management software functions on your system.

Table 23–1 Power Management Features in Different SPARC Architectures

Power Management Features 

sun4m  

sun4u (Energy Star 2.0) 

sun4u (Energy Star 3.0) 

Servers 

Display PM Available 

Yes 

Yes 

Yes 

Yes 

Display PM by Default 

Yes 

Yes 

Yes 

Yes 

Device PM Available 

No 

No 

Yes 

No 

Device PM by Default 

N/A 

N/A 

Yes 

N/A 

Suspend-Resume Available 

Yes 

Yes 

Yes 

No 

Suspend-Resume by Default 

No 

Yes 

No 

N/A 

AutoShutDown Available 

No 

Yes 

Yes 

No 

AutoWakeup by Default 

N/A 

Yes 

No 

N/A 

Note –

The SPARCstationTM Voyager is a sun4m-architecture system, but is not supported in this Solaris release.