HD PVR is power hungry

[killkom]

Hi all

I recently purchased one of these Efergy E2 power monitors for my house just to start seeing where I can cut back on my power usage before Eskom gives us another wiping

I have learnt quite a bit about power usage in my house so far

One thing that was quite surprising is that my HD PVR Decoder eats 100 watts of electricity weather it is on Standby or it is running. There is actually no difference between standby and fully on.

This is quite bad thing by Multichoice bringing in a non power efficient decoder knowing how the power situation is in our country

I am sure they can fix this I would switch it off during the day but it would not record anything

Come on Multichoice you can do better than this.

100 Watts does not seem like a lot but it adds up during the day when I am not home my power usage is between 150 and 300 Watts the DSTV decoder account for 100 Watts of that in some cases that is almost half

Every 10 hours the Decoder is powered it goes through a unit of electricity there are 720 hours in a month that accounts for 72 units of electricity per month that is R41.00 per month in Summer and and R53.00 per month in Winter with the new price hikes that they are planning this decoder is going to cost over a R100.00 per month to run all by itself that's crazy

 

[Nerfherder]

Do you turn off the hard drive ?

 

[killkom]

Yeah when you switch it to standby the you can hear the hard drive go off but the power usage of the unit stays the same or very close so it looks like it only switches off the hard drive and nothing else. So you have a fully functioning NON PVR decoder that you can't use

 

[Nerfherder]

Well seeming as the average pc uses more than 300w is ok.

 

[jatan]

Nerfherder, that statement is actually far from the truth...

The avargage PC has a 300W power supply, but does not consume nearly that amount of power...

If the decoder actually uses 100W constantly, that is pretty nasty ....

 

[d0b33]

My quad core with 9600GT uses 112W for normal use, that's pretty bad for a PVR.

 

[killkom]

The sick thing is that when you put you tv or amp on standby they use very little like 2 watts the decoder still uses 100W

I suppose its to keep the signal but there must be a better way to do it I'm going to post this on the DSTV forum and see what they say

 

[DagegeN]

...Every 10 hours the Decoder is powered it goes through a unit of electricity there are 720 hours in a month that accounts for 72 units of electricity per month that is R41.00 per month in Summer and and R53.00 per month in Winter with the new price hikes that they are planning this decoder is going to cost over a R100.00 per month to run all by itself that's crazy

WTF this means my PVR is accountable for almost 10% of my electricity usage at home

 

[Smurfatefrog]

The sick thing is that when you put you tv or amp on standby they use very little like 2 watts the decoder still uses 100W

I suppose its to keep the signal but there must be a better way to do it I'm going to post this on the DSTV forum and see what they say

Please do, this is quite scary
Have you tested this on any other decoders?

Its also around 10% of my total electricity account, plus I also have a 1110 running (mainly on standby though)

 

[d0b33]

This is why monochoice should use popular standards so we can buy our own PVRs that make the DSTV decoders look like the **** they are.

 

[killkom]

No I have only got the HD PVR

I don't know if the 1110 will use the same as the HD PVR because it has only got 1 Receiver but when you put it on standby I would bet it does not switch off anything it just displays the time on the screen that's all.

 

[Smurfatefrog]

No I have only got the HD PVR

I don't know if the 1110 will use the same as the HD PVR because it has only got 1 Receiver but when you put it on standby I would bet it does not switch off anything it just displays the time on the screen that's all.

Yup, it will definitely use a lot less but will be interesting to see if putting it in standby helps. Even though I mainly use it as a clock so will leave it in standby anyway

Also, is anything else powered off the HDPVR like a multiswitch or TV link? (i'm sure that minimal though)

 

[MAVADO]

That is because the HD-PVR doesn't have a standby option. Sure they call it that, but really, all you're doing is turning off the HDD... that's it.

If you touch the top of the decoder after awhile even, you will notice no drop in temperature. Same power, all the time... ridiculous!

 

[d0b33]

So is there an alternative? a non-monochoice HD PVR decoder that will work with DSTV?

 

[Milano]

The sick thing is that when you put you tv or amp on standby they use very little like 2 watts the decoder still uses 100W

I suppose its to keep the signal but there must be a better way to do it I'm going to post this on the DSTV forum and see what they say

Please provide a link to the thread once you have posted...

 

[ponder]

This is quite bad thing by Multichoice bringing in a non power efficient decoder knowing how the power situation is in our country

Come on Multichoice you can do better than this.

Maybe you should blame UEC instead, I think they design & manufacture them.

Wonder if they are allowed to sell these things in europe seeing they use so much power and the EU is going green.

 

[d0b33]

Maybe you should blame UEC instead, I think they design & manufacture them..

Well multichoice placed all their eggs in one basket and we're the ones who suffer, they could outsource to more manufacturers or import more options rather than just choose UEC.

 

[ToxicBunny]

The HDPVR is manufactured by Pace.. not UEC

 

[ToxicBunny]

The Pace decoder that MC are using is a derivative of the TDS850.

Specifically its the TDS850IMC.

The root version of this product had an operating power usage of about 30W from what I can gather... so something tells me the extra LNB and bigger HDD shouldn't account for another 70W

 

[MrSmith]

I tried to post a link to this thread on the DSTV forum yesterday but it did not "post" yet, is there a strict review of post by the moderators first?