Personal Computers and your Eskom bill – household consolidation by necessity
How much power does your PC need?
How much power does your PC need?
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How much power does your PC need?
- Thread starter Tomo3000
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porchrat
Honorary Master
Electricity price hike doesn't affect the smelters they have long-term contracts that have been in place since the 70s if I recall correctly. In fact I believe their power is supplied at below cost and we are required to subsidise it.
drukkie
Expert Member
and it's not even our smelters...most are from australia...as per carte blanche
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
220 Volts
drukkie
Expert Member
lol 6 amps
calvincoetzee
Well-Known Member
1 Kilowatt hour on average costs a rounded 50c, a mid - high end pc draws 500 Watt, therefore it costs 50c every two hours.
R6 for 24 hours.
R180 a month.
now I may be wrong, but I'm quite certain that these calculations are correct, at 500 Watt, and 50c/KiloWatt from Eskom. I think it's slighly less off peak, and changes according to season.
R6 for 24 hours.
R180 a month.
now I may be wrong, but I'm quite certain that these calculations are correct, at 500 Watt, and 50c/KiloWatt from Eskom. I think it's slighly less off peak, and changes according to season.
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porchrat
Honorary Master
the first world continues to milk the third, developing, emerging markets
That wasn't the reason (not in my opinion anyway). Remember when those deals were signed SA had extra capacity. Those deals were designed to get investment into the country despite all the global negative press surrounding the treatment of people of colour in this country. It wasn't about first world countries trying to milk us at all.
At the time those prices were completely acceptable because for the foreseeable future we had ample generating capacity, all we were doing was making the most of what would have been wasted power anyway and at the same time encouraging investment that would not otherwise have occurred. The Nats didn't foresee the mess that Eskom was to become though so now those deals are a little unfavourable to say the least. There is no way out of those deals in the short-term short because the smelters are hardly likely to entertain changing the prices those contracts give them. Dissolving Eskom and privatising electricity generation could potentially be a way to nullify the contracts but that isn't going to happen anytime soon.
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Just because you have a 500 Watt power supply does not mean that the machine utilizes that amount of power. I have 2 machines on 24/7 and there's no way they are costing me that much...
Your pc wont draw 500w continuiousousouly (spelling "might" be wrong). You're system might only need 350w of that in total at peak performance, but idle at say 200w.
All figures are just as an example. Easiest is to hook up a volt meter to it (dont do it if you dont know what you're doing).
Remember, hard drives spin down, graphic cards idle ect ect...
All figures are just as an example. Easiest is to hook up a volt meter to it (dont do it if you dont know what you're doing).
Remember, hard drives spin down, graphic cards idle ect ect...
calvincoetzee
Well-Known Member
Of course, just taking the absolute maximum, for instance a hard disk takes about 8Watt on load, the core i7 processor is around 130Watt (Intel Site)
Sure it's not 500 Watt continiously although better give the maximum cost.
I still think R180 a month at maximum load, if it were to draw 500 Watt continiously, is not that costly.
My notebook is on 24/7 (max 19V 6A) , the only power saving I have on it is the cpu scaling, but I estimate it draws about 50 Watt on average which makes it quite affordable.
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Praeses
Executive Member
I declock my laptop and my desktop's CPUs and GFX cards when I don't need the power. Win7 runs fine on a declocked 9600M GT, so why waste the power? 
The CPU's also reduce the V-core as the multiplier drops = uses much less power when just browsing the web or doing a download. Laptop on 0.9250V-core as I'm typing this
My desktop's PSU is also rated at 80+ efficiency, so less power-wastage. I want a 90% efficiency PSU though
The CPU's also reduce the V-core as the multiplier drops = uses much less power when just browsing the web or doing a download. Laptop on 0.9250V-core as I'm typing this My desktop's PSU is also rated at 80+ efficiency, so less power-wastage. I want a 90% efficiency PSU though
phoneJunky
Executive Member
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Doesn't the screen consume the most electricity? Just switch it of when it is idle.
Rouxenator
Dank meme lord
What is with these "computer" things they talk about? And those power ratings! Insane... they run not only into double digits but triple digits!!!
Nah, the 2w my Nokia 5800 consumes at peak is enough to enable me to take over the world
Nah, the 2w my Nokia 5800 consumes at peak is enough to enable me to take over the world
HavocXphere
Honorary Master
Or mentioning sleep/standby.
I do think we'll be seeing a move towards high efficiency PSUs on new purchases though.
Yes, but you have to note that if it's running 24/7 it's most probably not using 500W all the time, as when surfing or just being idle the GPU and CPU are not pulling much power, so probably 150W when idle/surfing and up to 500W gaming.
mysticBoer
Well-Known Member
Someone in our company had to calculate exactly this a few months ago. See below.
Note that it is with the screen of and on-board graphics.
Note that it is with the screen of and on-board graphics.