Epeat Rating System
Trying to describe everything about a computer's environmental impact from beginning to end is complex. To accomplish this, EPEAT's eligibility criteria is broken into eight categories. Each category includes mandatory criteria that a device must meet to earn the lowest level of EPEAT certifi- cation. There are also optional criteria that a manufacturer can meet to demonstrate their higher commitment to a clean environment. The EPEAT is aimed squarely at large commercial and government...
Apm Shortcomings
It did not take long after its introduction before APM was panned by the trade press. People using it felt that it would abruptly shut down in the middle an application and result in lost data. The only way to wake the system up was to reboot it. Consequently, most people avoided it, and the technical trade press regularly hammered its shortcomings. APM's primary limitation was its hardware centric architecture. Computer manufacturers sometimes implemented it slightly differently from the...
Power Supply Inefficiency Comes From Its Design
A power supply is a multistep operation. The first step is to reduce the voltage from 120 volts wall power to the level required by the device. The device's plug that you push into the wall receptacle connects the power lines to the computer's power supply transformer. A transformer is a set of coils. The primary coil is connected to the incoming power, and the secondary coil is connected to the next step in the power supply. Based on the number of windings in the coils, the voltage can be...
The Basics Of Green Computing
GREEN TECHNOLOGIES is a term that some business leaders believe espouses a back-to-nature philosophy and denounces all industry. However, the reality is much more positive than that. Green Technologies is the reduced environmental impact from running an Information Technology IT department. Green is just another term for the efficient use of technologies. In this case, we are referring primarily to electronic equipment. Efficient happens to also coincide with lowest cost and most...
Improving The New Floor Plan
After the new floor plan is in place, rerun the spaghetti chart study. Estimate the number of steps now required, and calculate how much time will be saved on a typical shift. A few steps saved here and there can add up over time, especially if some of those involve toting heavy boxes of paper to the printers. Put that value on your 5S communications board. Then go back and see if the new floor plan can be made even better Everyone wants to work in a clean work space. Sometimes companies use a...
Disadvantages of Greening an IT Supply Chain
While greening an IT supply chain has many benefits, many challenges must be overcome, including Asking an IT Manager to Green a supply chain is like asking the supply chain manager to rebuild his or her own mainframe databases. The training and expertise is not there and the time to acquire it does not balance the lost time and money. Worrying about how Green a device may be distracts attention from buying the most effective and efficient device for the job. For example, how much of a...
Maryland Statewide Computer Recycling Pilot Program
The Statewide Computer Recycling Pilot Program enacted in Maryland in 2005 is designed to encourage computer manufacturers to establish takeback programs to collect and recycle, refurbish, or reuse end-of-life computers. It applies to any computer manufacturer that sells more than 1,000 computers a year in the state. Manufacturers are charged an initial 5,000 registration fee to sell computers in Maryland. Manufacturers that establish such recovery programs are required to pay a 500 annual fee...
Before And After Process Maps 1
installation. Under each step is a comment about the amount of time required before the next step begins. The left side of the figure is the before the right side is the after. In the original process, everyone needed time to evaluate the requested change just to be sure that it did not adversely impact their area. In the After Process Map, all members of the support staff receive the application change request. They only need to reply if they wish to stop it. In this way, the cycle time for...
The Bottom Line Dgq
APM was the original industry standard for workstation power management. It was created originally to support notebook PCs. APM gained a reputation as something that destabilized a computer's predictable performance. This was often the result of adding components to the computer after it was delivered to the customer. APM lives on in legacy computing systems and is currently offered as part of Linux. However, most hardware manufacturers and software developers have moved on to ACPI because of...
Matching Work And Workers
Virtual teams open other possibilities for IT departments. Applications development is an area that has long suffered from a shortage of skilled workers and slower schedules for systems development than customers find acceptable. By creating virtual teams, the company can match the available work with the available labor. If JAVA programmers are needed in Boston and these people prefer to live in Casper, Wyoming, virtual teaming may be the answer. The programmers in Wyoming can submit their...
Electronic Storage
There are several options for the storage of digital documents On-line storage, usually in the form of magnetic media such as hard drives. This type of storage is becoming increasingly less expensive and allows for fast access to digital documents. Technologies, such as storage area networks SANs and network attached storage NASs , support the scaling of storage requirements to whatever is needed. Its major drawbacks are that a hard drive contains a large number of moving parts that are subject...
Spaghetti Lines Showing Operator Movements
To make the work status visible, a big screen monitor is posted on the wall so everyone in the print room can quickly see the print jobs, both pending and completed. A duplicate of this monitor is mounted outside of the door where customers pick up their reports. The final step in this phase is to present the team's findings to the executive sponsor for approval and action. Moving this equipment around will require some work by company electricians. The large displays that provide a more visual...
Visual Work Place
A valuable concept to try in your IT environment is the Visual Work place. A work place is visual when someone can walk into the room and know what is going on and how work is progressing. Besides the large screen monitor, another way to make the work place more visual is through signage. Many cubicles use name plates so that people are easier to find. If a particular person is not in his or her office, a visitor would understand that the employee might not be present that day. Similarly, if...
Acknowledgments
Michael dedicates this book to his teacher and mentor, George Jenkins, whose encouragement and support have been invaluable over the years, and to his wife and best friend, Tami, for all her support during his many projects. This book was made possible by the support of many different people, who all do their part to make the world a better place and who gave generously of their time to help make this a better book. The authors would like to thank Robert Houghton, President of Redemtech for...
The Apm Standard
The first serious attempt at an industry-wide solution to the power management of personal computers began in 1992. Intel, IBM, and Microsoft worked together to develop a standard solution. The result was the Advanced Power Management APM standard. APM first appeared in Windows 3.11, and then in an upgraded form in Windows 95. APM is a hardware centric solution. Its key components are BIOS - The central control for switching power states is managed by the motherboard's Basic Input Output System...
Green as a Competitive Strategy
With apologies to Mr. Shakespeare, To Green or not to Green, is not the question. Changes in the legal landscape have already forced companies to change their business practices. The trick is to identify these changes early, so they can be eased into the organization's business processes without the sudden shock of a last-minute requirement. Once the problem statement has been approved, and a baseline metric has been determined, the next step is to select a strategy for achieving organizational...
Desktop Virtualization 1
Ability to use your desktop environment from any PC with network or Internet access. Access to typical desktop features, such as multiple monitors, USB devices, and so on. Disaster recovery at the desktop is simplified, as a new device can be quickly installed to use the virtualized image on the server. Backups can be managed at the server level. Virtualization of the desktop also creates the opportunity to have desktops provided through the Internet, much as many vendors are doing with...
Pulling It All Together
Once the Corporate Vision for Green Computing has been developed, the business case must detail the milestones for achieving this goal, the estimated time to get there, and the estimated cost in money and resources. Everyone has experienced a desire to achieve a goal, but lacked the resources to accomplish it. Therefore, no matter how good the business case sounds or how attractive the potential results, the executive readers will want to know how much it is going to cost. Sometimes, this...