E6500 power consumption seems high

hi
I have latitude e6500 p9500/4gb ram/nvs 160m/wxga+ LED/500gb hdd/win xp sp3. With 6cell battery i have discharge rate 15-16W in idle state at low brightness and wireless off. Web surfing thru wi-fi - 19W power consumption.

 

Doesn't sound half bad; you have dedicated graphics after all.

What is reported total battery life?

 

Approximate battery life 3 hours in idle state, web surfing - 2h 40min.

 

It's a little high, but nothing too far out of the ordinary. My E6400 with an NVS 160M was probably doing about 11W at idle. I'd check to see if you've got any rogue processes taking up CPU power while you're idling or under light load.

 

My idle cpu load is 0 - 11%

 

Which web browser do you use? I recommend Firefox with FlashBlock and Adblock which together keep out a lot of unnecessary stuff which use power (eg animated adverts).

I would start by looking at CPU usage with no internet (wired or wireless), display on minimum and nothing open except whatever you are using to monitor the power drain. How low can you get the power consumption? Also explore the extended battery life options in Dell ControlPoint > Power Manager.

I'm not familiar with the nVidia GPU, but I thought there was some power management options.

John