On Wednesday 14 January 2009, r <r.trev@fastwebmail.it> wrote about '[opensuse] wifi device and modules':

if I blacklist wifi modules ( ath5k and ath_pci and maybe ath_hal ) is the wifi device switched on anyway without be usable ( unitil I modprobe modules ) ???

The point is. Does it sucks battery energy in any case ?

PCI devices will run at full power until the OS tells them to enter a sleep mode.[1] Linux will not communicate with a device without its module.[2] So, those devices will probably draw *more* battery until you load the module, at which point, if the device is unused, Linux can put it to sleep.[3] -- Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. ,= ,-_-. =. bss@iguanasuicide.net ((_/)o o(\_)) ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy `-'(. .)`-' http://iguanasuicide.net/ \_/ [1] Not completely true. They power up enough to be ready for any standard request though. [2] Not completely true. Devices are asked to identify themselves in order to determine which module to load. [3] Assuming that device/module combination was sleep features.