The "well-managed" scenario assumes use of power management settings on all devices, with desktops remaining on through the night. It assumes notebooks are turned off or put in suspend mode 50 percent of the time after hours and of these, 50 percent are unplugged.

In the "unmanaged" scenario, power management is left up to the users, 50 percent of which use it, in various configurations during the day and after hours.

In the unplugged scenario, all PC devices are unplugged when not in use after hours.

Gartner's model can be used to assess the PC-related power consumption in any organization, said Smulders.