Laptop basics

Laptop users should be especially concerned with power consumption, as their devices are often reliant on the limited power supply of a battery pack, to say nothing of energy costs that come into play when a system is plugged into a wall outlet to run or recharge the battery.

Few groups have dedicated as much research and development into power efficiency as portable PC makers have, resulting in a plethora of low-voltage processors, energy-efficient LED displays, solid-state hard drives with no moving parts, and various power-conserving operating-system features.

In this guide, we'll explore some of the factors that affect power consumption for laptops, including the variety of allegedly energy-efficient components available, how to best set up your laptop for the right balance of performance and energy use, and how we test laptops to determine how much power they use and how much that power will cost over the course of a year.