# Idle energy usage of disconnected clients **URL:** \ **Category:** Player Features & Ideas\ **Tags:** client\ **Created:** [August 4, 2022, 9:31pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408 "2022-08-04T21:31:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Nirma\_Naran](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/nirma_naran/32/384386_2.png) [@Nirma\_Naran](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Nirma_Naran)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2022, 9:31pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/1 "2022-08-04T21:31:10Z")
**TLDR:** Lots of players leave clients running when AFK, and sometimes those clients DC, but keep using the same amount of energy. Thus, CCP could make their MMO a little more green, without negatively impacting customers, by making DC clients automatically shut down after a few minutes. An alternative would be to use the new “no 3D graphics” mode that can be enabled by pressing ctrl+shift+F9. **Longer version:** _The situation_ The eve client seems to consume the usual amount of energy, even after disconnect. Like many other plays, I basically never close my Eve clients. When I stop playing at night, I just send my computer to sleep. When it wakes up, the eve clients are still running, but obviously disconnected. Despite this, however, they still use the usual amount of CPU/GPU resources. This wastes a lot of energy. _The solution:_ I can think of two solutions that should be relatively straight-forward to implement: 1. Have the client shut down X time after disconnecting. A reasonable time-frame would be 1 minute to 5 minutes, IMHO. 2. Have the client auto-press ctrl+shift+F9 on disconnect, the new short-cut to disable 3d graphics. This would significantly decrease the idle energy usage of the client. ---
**Author:** ![Shipwreck\_Jones](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/shipwreck_jones/32/274382_2.png) [@Shipwreck\_Jones](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Shipwreck_Jones)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2022, 11:11pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/2 "2022-08-04T23:11:24Z")
Sleep mode suspends power to all components of the computer aside for RAM, which it keeps powered so that it doesn’t lose it’s contents, allowing you to quickly resume what you were doing later. This is good for battery life and power usage, because RAM uses a relatively low amount of power, especially when it comes to gaming computers with power hungry CPU’s and GPU’s. Thus, the short and skinny of it, is that no, the clients won’t be using a ton of power while your computer is asleep. Also, you do realize that you’ve just made a post asking for developer resources to be allocated to changing client behavior because you’re a weird edge case who’s too lazy to spend 2.3 seconds manually shutting down programs when you’re done using them, right? ---
**Author:** ![Nirma\_Naran](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/nirma_naran/32/384386_2.png) [@Nirma\_Naran](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Nirma_Naran)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2022, 12:22am UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/3 "2022-08-05T00:22:12Z")
I might have not been very clear about what my issue is. Sleep is not the issue. My issue is that a client consumes a significant amount of resources even after it’s “dead”. It is not possible for a client to recover from being disconnected - you have to close it and launch a new client. Therefore, there is no reason why it should continue to consume as many resources as a “living” client indefinitely. ---
**Author:** ![Shipwreck\_Jones](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/shipwreck_jones/32/274382_2.png) [@Shipwreck\_Jones](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Shipwreck_Jones)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2022, 1:45am UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/4 "2022-08-05T01:45:16Z")
Okay, are you trying to make a green argument. If so, you might want to phrase it something like this: Lots of players leave clients running when AFK, and sometimes those clients DC, but keep using the same amount of energy. Thus, CCP could make their MMO a little more green, without negatively impacting customers, by making DC clients automatically shut down after a few minutes. ---
**Author:** ![Nirma\_Naran](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/nirma_naran/32/384386_2.png) [@Nirma\_Naran](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Nirma_Naran)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2022, 2:13am UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/5 "2022-08-05T02:13:25Z")
That is an excellent way to phrase it. I have updated my original post. ---
**Author:** ![Geminus\_Duolphus](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/geminus_duolphus/32/329938_2.png) [@Geminus\_Duolphus](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Geminus_Duolphus)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2022, 7:45am UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/6 "2022-08-05T07:45:31Z")
I agree this would be a positive change given the amount of apparent afk behaviour in game. I’m more excited by the idea of a non 3D mode. I’m picturing 2D doom like graphics in space where the images mirror as they turn and have classic 16 bit explosions and it sounds glorious. I’d actually just switch that thing on most of the time. Is this actually a thing? ---
**Author:** ![Moko\_Musana](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/moko_musana/32/373694_2.png) [@Moko\_Musana](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Moko_Musana)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2022, 3:18pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/7 "2022-08-05T15:18:52Z")
Nah, it’s the dscan window, dragged next to the local channel members list. Nothing else is ever needed on afk/cctv alts anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Dredwerkz](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/dredwerkz/32/282494_2.png) [@Dredwerkz](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Dredwerkz)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2022, 9:29pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/8 "2022-08-05T21:29:48Z")
> [@Shipwreck\_Jones](#): > > because you’re a weird edge case who’s too lazy to spend 2.3 seconds manually shutting down programs Or could just click shut down instead of sleep. Also I’m pretty sure op knows what sleep is for. Lastly to OP, pay my electric bill and I’ll begin listening to your opinion on energy. ---
**Author:** ![Nirma\_Naran](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/nirma_naran/32/384386_2.png) [@Nirma\_Naran](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Nirma_Naran)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2022, 5:14pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/9 "2022-08-06T17:14:41Z")
Sleep/shut down is beside the point. My point is that a “dead” Eve client consumes the same amount of resources as a “living” client. There simply is no reason it has be like that. A lot of things could happen when you get disconnected: 1. The client could just close itself 2. The client could go into the “no 3d graphics” mode (ctr+shift+F9) 3. Another alternative would be to send the client back to log-in screen on disconnect. That solution would likely be far more complicated to implement, but would offer big advantages to people who play with bad internet connections. They could be in the game again far quicker and might not lose their ship. ---
**Author:** ![Dredwerkz](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/dredwerkz/32/282494_2.png) [@Dredwerkz](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Dredwerkz)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2022, 5:42pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/10 "2022-08-06T17:42:36Z")
Just closing would probably cause several complaints because it would just look like it’s crashed. If you’re still concerned with energy, do your part and don’t play afk. ---
**Author:** ![Uriel\_the\_Flame](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/user_avatar/forums.eveonline.com/uriel_the_flame/32/490165_2.png) [@Uriel\_the\_Flame](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/Uriel_the_Flame)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2022, 5:50pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/11 "2022-08-06T17:50:28Z")
It is official now: `Being AFK is bad for the environment.` Carebears, think of ~~the children~~ nature and future generations and stop being AFK. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/eveonline/original/3X/4/1/41ec4921cbaca7a6f9ea556e7cc20018461eae5e.png) [@system](https://forums.eveonline.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2022, 5:50pm UTC](https://forums.eveonline.com/t/idle-energy-usage-of-disconnected-clients/372408/12 "2022-11-04T17:50:53Z")
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