Thanks to Paul and Chris for suggesting Powetop for my Ubuntu laptop.
Since installing that, things have gone very well. I now get way more
battery life (like over three hours, though not as good as Windows 7
supposedly gets on the same laptop)
For those that don't know, after you install it and run it as root, it
checks your system to see what resources it might minimize.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerTOP
From wikipedia,
"PowerTOP is a software utility designed to measure, explain and
minimise a computer's electrical power consumption. It was released by
Intel in 2007 under the GPLv2 license. It works for both Intel and AMD
processors.
PowerTOP analyzes the programs, device drivers, and kernel options
running on a computer based on the Linux and Solaris operating systems,
and estimates the power consumption resulting from their use. This
information may be used to pinpoint software that results in excessive
power use. Many open source and free software programs, such as Mozilla
Firefox [1][2], have been patched to reduce their power consumption
since the release of PowerTOP. This is particularly useful for laptop
computer users who wish to prolong battery life, and data center
operators, for whom electrical and cooling costs are a major expenditure.
The original focus was on CPU sleep states, and showing the programs or
drivers responsible for "wakeups" which prevent CPUs entering sleep
states. A database of known problems automatically provides more user
friendly "tips" for specific sources of wakeups. However, it also shows
information on CPU frequency scaling. Over time the database has been
expanded to include tips on a wide range of power consumption issues.
It is most effective on laptop computers. Laptops are specifically
designed to allow power use to be both monitored and controlled. In
particular, many laptop computers can measure the rate of battery use
(when not connected to mains power). PowerTOP uses this feature to
estimate power usage in Watts and battery life. This provides immediate
feedback on changes made e.g. disabling wireless networking when not used."
