University spin-off company launches free energy-saving software for PC Windows users

3 Feb 2010

MiserWare Inc. of Blacksburg, Va., founded by Professor Kirk Cameron and Joseph Turner in 2007 to commercialize energy-saving technologies developed at Virginia Tech for PCs, laptops, and servers, is giving away software.

Early technologies were designed for shared servers, but the company is now offering energy-saving software for individual Windows-based computers – free. In laptops, energy savings equate to extended battery life while the laptop is in use.

"We set out to save the world," said Cameron, director of the Scalable Performance Laboratory and an associate professor of computer science at Virginia Tech. “We wanted to spread the impact of the technologies we developed to reduce energy waste in computers by creating software for use by the masses.”

MiserWare announces the availability of a free Windows version of their software that saves energy in just about any computer running Windows. Turner, vice president of engineering and a computer science doctoral student in the College of Engineering, said the technology is intelligent. “Our software adapts to the user’s needs. It’s like having a car that is as fast as a Ferrari when you need it, yet as efficient as a Prius.”

The researchers turned entrepreneurs are not new to innovation. Cameron’s laboratory has been developing energy efficiency techniques for computers for nearly a decade. Over the past five years, his lab has been awarded nearly $4 million in external grants for their green information technology research to improve the energy efficiency of servers.

According to Cameron, the first MiserWare products can save as much as 35 percent of server energy use. For a typical server, savings can be $100 per year with an additional savings of $100 in reduced cooling. "The key selling point of the software is that these savings come without loss of system performance; so, data center operators do not need to worry about the software affecting existing service levels," he said.

MiserWare is a software power management company based in Blacksburg, Va. MiserWare makes software that reduces energy waste in computers without compromising performance. Learn more about MiserWare on Twitter and Facebook. MiserWare’s free energy saving software for Windows and Linux can be downloaded from their website.

The Scalable Performance laboratory at Virginia Tech is directed by Kirk Cameron. The laboratory studies techniques that improve the efficiency of high-performance systems. The lab pioneered techniques that conserve the performance of high-end systems while making them more energy efficient.