Unfortunate Side Effects

Over the last year or so, I've shifted my old Pentium III based machinery to Core 2 Duo and AMD64 based systems. (At the moment, the Windows box runs the Core 2 Duo, and the Linux box is AMD64 powered. The MacBook is a Core 2 Duo as well, of course.)

Also, over this time, there has been an increasing awareness of the need for power saving features in modern PCs. Linux has moved to a tickless idle and has worked hard at reducing the wakeups per second, so that the processor has a chance to maintain deeper sleep states for longer.

I presume that WinXP has had a few updates along those lines as well, although they may be in the Cool'n'Quiet (AMD64) or EnhancedSpeedstep (Intel) drivers.

During the hot months, this is great, as I no longer have a pair of space heaters under my desk attempting to cook my feet when idling. I've certainly noticed the difference inpower bills which have been shrinking all year. Mind you, a lot of this was due to my travelling, but I was still using the Linux box remotely, and there are other people in this household.

During winter, this has had the unfortunate side effect of following the ambient temperature more closely and not even keeping my feet warm when I've got the Windows box flat out and gaming!

Winter in Hong Kong is not normally all that cold, but the day-time external temperature has been hovering around 10 °C for the last almost two weeks, which is very cold indeed for Hong Kong. When combined with the complete lack of insulation of your typical flat here, and the generally poor weather sealing of the apartments, if it's 10 °C outside, it's not much different inside.