- Select Start > Settings > Control Panel from the Start Menu.
- The Control Panel has two views. If you are in Theme View select System Maintenance and then Power Options.
Note: Power settings in Windows Vista are based on power plans. A power plan is a collection of hardware and system settings that manages how your computer uses power. Power plans help you balance the tradeoff between battery life and system performance. Windows Vista includes the three Windows default power plans, and you can create your own.
If you are in Classic View of the Control Panel, simply double click on Power Options.
- Once you are in Power Options, click "Create a power plan" link.
- Enter a name for your new plan in the "Plan name" field and click Next.
- The initial screen for editing a plan allows you to change the monitor and sleep timeout settings. Set Turn off the display for 15 minutes (or less).
- Set Put computer to sleep for 30 minutes (or less).
- Click the Create button to create and activate your new Power Plan.
- To make additional changes, click on “Change plan settings” underneath the name of the plan you just created.
- Click on Change advanced power settings. Here you will be able to enable or set values for a variety of Power Management options.
- Set Turn off hard disks after 15 minutes (or less)
- Click Okay.
- Click Save changes.
- You should now see your custom plan available in the list. You can change between plans by selecting the associated radio button.
Situations That Cause Vista to Not Sleep PCs may not enter sleep mode when they have a file open over the network. Graphics-intensive screen savers can prevent PCs from entering sleep mode as well, and should be disabled.
Otherwise Vista should not allow software applications to stop it from going to sleep. However, it is possible for a network administrator to change this default, allowing applications to "veto" sleep when they are busy. The default can be changed using Group Policy, but cannot be set through the Power Options applet in the Control Panel.
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