Silly windows users... no plugs were ever needed in linux.
I got the shits with linux. plus i can have about a billion other programs running on my miner with windows
If you have a dedicated miner, linux, or rather BAMT is excellent. I unplugged the cpu fan! Flashing clocks in GPU bios also reduces the overhead as the mining program pools the hardware at intervals to check settings, the GPU don't mine while being pooled. Thats why you don't run variable fans either.
Linux gave me 5% more hashing and saved 50w in power. And you have zero downtime!