Good tips, thanks.

Another option, especially in California is to get a solar power system. With PG&E's "Net Metering", at peak times you are getting a 3 to 1 ratio (in $) on power you consume vs power you use. I have 5 servers and a bunch of other electronic devices running (e.g. 4 ReplayTVs) running 24/7 and my PG&E bill is still only $5/month (due to minimum state fees).

For more details (technical, financial, etc...) see:

http://www.factsofisrael.com/blog/archives/000714.html

Wow, that'd be great.. if I could afford to buy a home in the Bay Area!

---

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/05/17/BUGRVCQ3Q61.DTL&type=business

Strong demand and low interest rates through the early spring helped push the median price for a single-family home in the nine counties to $622,000.

---

So much for that whole American dream thing...

I used to have this big server fetish back in the day.. had a crazy dual xeon with 2gb of memory and 6 40gb HDs all stuffed in a full size ATX chassis with a bazillion fans inside my closet.

What did I use it for? personal web host, and to host a few non-production client apps/sites and as a place to store a bunch of media files so I can access them from around the house. Power consumption was off the charts.

fast forward 3 years. I realized a) I didn't need that much power and b) more powerful stuff got cheaper and less power hungry. Tossed the old box and replaced with a mini-ITX setup (tiny box, tiny PSU, 1 fan(soon to be replaced by a passive cooling solution)) with integrated everything (lan, video, etc etc) and a single 30gb drive to hold the win2k3 and SQL 2000. No CDROM. I was going to extend the theme and use a notebook drive as well, but I wanted something reliable.

Then I grabbed an el-cheapo NAS dealie and tossed in a pair of 200gb seagates to hold all my documents, media, recorded tv shows, etc etc. Now I just sit back and see how long it takes for a $8 a month power savings to recoup the $1000+ I put into this new setup. =)

> Now I just sit back and see how long it takes for a $8 a month power savings to recoup the $1000+ I put into this new setup. =)

LOL, exactly ;)

It's all about striking a balance between cash outlay and potential longer term savings.

I like mini-itx, but those damn CPUs are way underpowered. For reference, a 1ghz C3 "Nehemiah" CPU benchmarks out at around the P2-500 level. A Pentium-M system is easily 3x-4x more powerful at the same wattage. It's also much more expensive, of course..

Now that I think about this, that $20 a month I'm spending on power might be better used to pay a web hosting service. That would take me to zero watts, but I'd be sacrificing personal control over my stuff, too.

I use second hand laptops for server stuff. Especially trivia like firewalls, print servers etc can easily be handled by even the oldest laptop. I buy the occasional laptop hard disk, but the last laptop I was given has USB2 so it'll take a fast external disk if I ever need that. Note that you don't care if the screen is broken, as long as it'll drive an external monitor when you need it to (or run linux straight off the CD drive for many things).

Power consumption is very low (45 watts peak, 10W or less with the disk spun down), and most laptops now use relatively efficient switch mode power supplies.

The saving mount up - my two laptops have cost me about $US100 so far (that new hard disk) which should pay off in about a year.

Moz

160 W = 2-3 lightbulbs. All power savings should be measured in light bulbs; your standard 60W bulb is a good measure. It's an understandable unit that most people can understand.

It can cost several hundred dollars to drop the power consumption of a computer from 160W average to 100W (1 light bulb), and even more down to 40W (2 light bulbs). It costs about $5 to replace an incandescent bulb drawing 60W with a fluorescent bulb drawing 10-15W. Replacing all lightbulbs in your typical house (between 20 - 50!) with fluoresecent bulbs will result in significant power savings for a fairly modest cash outlay (which will tend to be re-couped just in the cost of replacing the lightbulbs).

While saving power is good, don't target your computer first. Other good places to start are your hot water system, airconditioning and heating, your refrigerator (bad seals on a fridge can be a huge power draw!), the laundry, TV and radio. Nearly all of these will provide bigger power savings for the buck (many of these just require you to change habits - e.g. don't leave the TV on if it is not being watched)

A detailed refutation that leaving your computer on all the time is, in any way, a good idea:
http://jasonsears.modblog.com/core.mod?show=blogview&blog_id=767556

> A detailed refutation that leaving your computer on all the time is, in any way, a good idea:

With all due respect.. duh?

I certainly wasn't advocating leaving a PC on all the time just because.

I need the home theater PC on to record television and allow remote scheduling over HTTP; I need the server on to serve up codinghorror.com along with other web content, SMTP, POP3, FTP and other miscellaneous long running tasks.

It is possible to use S3 suspend with Windows MCE and scheduled recordings, however, my HTPC developed a disturbing habit of hanging on wakeup about 20 percent of the time..

Or you could just shut down your MCE box and make your server wake it when need it (http access to a page served by said server and backed by a script or/and on schedule). WOL is your friend, and if it fails you, there are some sub $5 solutions that take a more hardware oriented approach. We use this regularly with embedded machines here on the coin-op part of IT.

That's probably a low-ball number you've got there. Keep in mind that the kWpH the electricity company charges you for is how many watts your are using per-second. This means that it would cost you less to have a 10 Watt bulb on for two hours than it would to have a 20 Watt bulb on for one hour.

I've read somewhere a report that stated that most hardware failures occured during powering up (or down), and they even had some figures that show how companies that leave they computers running 24/7 have lower hardware-costs in the long run.

Now if I could just get *you* to turn off your three LCD monitors when you leave for the day...

:)

Scott

They turn off after 20 minutes. Otherwise who's gonna see my cool screen saver running across three monitors?

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000392.html

It's like Laser Floyd, but without the lasers. Or the Floyd.

Hey, I'm glad somebody brought up the idea of laptops. Your average laptop is optimized for a far lower power drain simply because it's designed to run on battery power. So, if you have a home desktop machine plus a laptop that you tote around, plugging the laptop in when you get home instead of powering up the desktop machine is probably going to save you some juice right off the bat. (Do the math, though, obviously.)

harveyswik: That goes against everything I've ever heard about electricity billing. Care to back it up?

Or just get rid of that physical box and start using a virtual server. I don't want to seem like a spammer so I won't go on about the I get mine off but it's a great way of being environment friendly while maintaining your own personal server thingy.

(oh what the chuff. I get mine from bytemark.co.uk - I recommend them.)

Oops, I just realized how old this discussion is...

My server runs a Via C7 mini-ITX formfactor (1.2GHz c7 cpu). It fits behind my desk, and when using a picoPSU and a 60W 12V brick powersupply, a kill-a-watt measures it at only 18W! I put it together with a 100GB laptop hard drive for about $400, and since I have become addicted to having a server up 24/7 this machine will pay for itself in a little over 2 years, as well as using about 10% of the power my p4 rig was using.

Good thing it will only take a couple months to pay off the measuring device :P

Much better ways to conserve energy are to make sure your house is insulated properly. Most electricity is used for heating and cooling, and proper insulation makes sure the hot or cold air stays where you want it. Running around making sure every electrical appliance you have in your home is drawing minimal power is kind of like a fat guy doing wrist curls at the gym. He's got bigger fish to fry.

Ha! What a great, geeky post. You'd get along great with my wife.

I bet Bre at www.imakethings.com could figure out a way to power your server with your hamster, or with excess energy from microwaving popcorn.

Thanks for putting this together -- power is the hidden cost we rarely factor in when buying electronics. I've put together a calculator here: http://tinyurl.com/2jb45v in case you want to plug in numbers on your own.

harveyswik and David: Electricity is billed by the kWh, not kWpH (nor kW/h for that matter). It is spelled kilowatts-hours and not kilowatts per hour. It is a measure of energy, calculated simply by: number of kilowatts used X number of hours they were used for.

Hence,
10W (aka 0.01 kW) light bulb X 2 hours = 0.02 kWh and
20W (aka 0.02 kW) light bulb X 1 hour = 0.02 kWh, as one would expect.

didnt know that it'd cost me this much ...
thanks ... good post ...

Why dont you research the matter properly before spouting pseudo science. I run 12 computers and a photocopier, which are all on 24/7. Unlike you I use a power meter to see what it costs. The average power consumption is 540 watts.

Tell that 2 my mom

You had some great suggestions but I'm not that computer literate so when you said let yor computer sleep, how would I do that?

14.28 cents/kWh ??

That's not expensive. I pay 36.97 cents/kWh

Speaking of saving power by using a laptop... When at home, I let my laptop battery drain to 10% or so, then power it up at work (or a friend's house). :)

Those of you thinking that you'd lose control of your server when moving it to a hosting provider in the effort to cut power costs might think about getting a virtual server instead. You'll get full root access to your server on a high-bandwidth link. Costs can be in line with shared hosting.

Google "cheap virtual server" to see what's there. I am not affiliated with any of the vendors. But I _can_ vouch for the enormous flexibility that virtualization provides.

I recently installed a little app called localcooling.
Check www.localcooling.com. It lets you set all kinds of powersaving stuff without knowing how, and it can tell you how much energy or money or trees you saved :-) nice app.

To Clive:

You should really consider buying a better watt-meter.

Have a look at this sweet free application... lets you minimize consumption - showing you how much you saved... really cool idea:

http://domain-hosting-design.com/2007/02/06/local-cooling-site-concept-design/

i leave my pc on 24/7 because i fold. helping find a cure for cancer is worth a few extra bucks a month.

Well that's why I have been using LAPTOP computers for years as all my servers. Get yourself a good laptop with a low-power CPU, such as AMD Turion, and my servers take typically between 10 and 20 WATTS TOTAL. That translates to $10-$20 PER YEAR here in Florida in electricity.

By the way, if your electricity cost is some $0.11/KWH, I use the rule of thumb that everything that is on all the time costs as much per year as consumes in Watts. So a typical desktop computer with 200Watts, will cost $200/year.

Actually you don't need to buy the little device to measure current draw. Granted, it will give you averages but a simple calculation will suffice.

Lets say your plasma draws 270W and you watch for 4 hours per day. 270x4 =1,080 or 1.08kWh. Then take that 1.08 and multiply at by your kWh charge, which ranges from 7 cents in heavily subsidized (the south) and 14 cents in less subsidized (the northeast). In my case that box would cost me 15 cents a day or $4.53 a month.

Getting rid of my desktop computer and going with a laptop made a big difference. The desktop sucked 600W x 24hrs, for 14.4kWh a day, or $2.02 per day, or $60.48 per month.

The laptop which is plugged in all day is all of 95W x 24hrs or 28 cents a day, $8.40 a month for a machine which is just as capable if not more so.

I Fold as well. I use the GPU client which uses even more power.
The machine is a 24/7 torrent machine & general work horse.

you can check the usage of electricity and heating in your home using this web chart
still in development
www.housegoinggreen.com

you can check the usage of electricity and heating in your home using this web chart
still in development
www.housegoinggreen.com

There are people who actually worry about $200 / a year? That own a computer? That buys software and high speed internet connections? You cannot be serious.

If you cannot afford the $200 to leave your computers on, then you will not be able to afford the computer, internet connection and software that you will need to operate the computer in the first place.

A better tip for you would be to sell your computer & cancel your internet connection and you might as well cancel your cable TV too and sell your LCD or Plasma.

$30 damn, Newegg has them for $17.99usd
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16882715001

If you run a Mac, use the System Preferences > Energy Saver > Schedule… option to automate when your computer turns itself on and off.

For detailed university research on what a modern computer costs to run, see: dssw.co.uk/research/

Jeff,
You need to divide by 1000 not by 100 when figuring your electricity cost. Your numbers are skewed. I pay .06c KWH so it cost very little to run my pcs for a year. However, it still a good idea to put the hard drives to sleep when idle.

It all depends on the "computer experts" you ask.
Some come from the old school and fear the startup of hard drives -
"Starting a hard drive is like starting a cold enigne in the winter".
Others will tell you that it is perfectly fine to shut down a compute once or twice a day.
Just do not do it incessently and cause strain on the computer power supply.
It all depends on the computer expert you ask .

http://www.mini-box.com has a PSU that claims 96% efficiency also there are perfectly good main boards that can use <20W http://www.via.com.tw so if you design your home theater/server with the appropriate parts you can cut your power usage even further. My other suggestion would be to use your home theatre PC as your server, consolidation is an easy way to cut your power usage by a factor of 2.

A previous poster already suggested most of these things

Someone should add up all the extra kWH that the folders are using up and then make a determination if their contribution to cancer/seti/etc is really worth all those tons of carbon in the atmosphere

600W for a desktop? Whats the CPU? I've got a bunch of older computer running various things. Here's some readings I've taken.
smoothwall on a PII 400 43W <-HD spun down
NASlite on a P 200 36W <-HD spun down
Geexbox PII 400 62w <-HD running 32 HD spundown
HAM Radio apps P 200 34W <HD running
Thats not counting 1 monitor on a KVM switch.

think about how much energy is burned running MRI's and CATscans and performing surgery and making synthetic drugs (often from petroleum) and transporting patients to and from hospitals and clinics.

an MRI machine uses kilowatts of electricity for each scan. the coils have to be cooled with liquid helium - typically about *1700 liters* of liquid helium. guess how much electricity it takes to keep that in a liquid state? huge amounts.

i don't think there's any question that working for a cure of cancer, alzheimers, BSE, etc, makes good environmental sense.

BTW, that $600k price tag is a HOUSE in the WORST Area. Take a $25,000 house in the midwest, that is what 600k will ALMOST BUY YOU OUT HERE.

About $2-3mill will buy you a decent, (just decent) house in a safe neighborhood in california, such as in Santa Clara. But it will still be a smaller house.

But you do get paid better out here, and the cost of living really isn't that much more, except housing, and insurance. Living in the valley on 140k a year, after 5 years you should be pulling in $200k a year if you invested in something on the side, which most people do.

Thank God I live in Kansas.

$0.008074 / KwH

Natural Gas prices suck though... :/

this is great!

i'm in the process of moving out and stressing about the utilities and such so this is exactly what i needed to read :)

(the michaelbluejay site helped a lot also.. godbless digg for helping me save money this month haha)

Kalid, your labeling is wrong at http://tinyurl.com/2jb45v
You give .1428 cents, it would be clearer to either be $.1428 or
14.28 cents per KWH. Without looking more closely I orginally entered what I pay 9 cents per KWH and was coming up with $2000 per year, "no way I thought"

Putting the hard drives to sleep is a bad idea. They're mechancial things, and having them power up and down over and over is definitely not going to be good for them. If you're really running a server, they're probably going to have to come on line pretty regularly if for nothing more than to just write entries in log files, etc.

Unfortunately we're in an age where the online capacity of hard drives has outpaced any feasible off-line storage medium. I've got a 2TB media drive, which is raid 6 of a bunch of (250GB) external usb drives. Of course it runs a bit slow, but I'm not looking for crazy bandwith, just a lot of space and redundancy. I have no way of backing this up, besidess buying another server and set of drives somewhere else and syncing the two, and leaving that online continuously. It's not even possible to buy another set of drives, store data on them, and then unplug them and leave them lying around; hard drives are notorioiusly bad at long-term storage when powered off.

I will say that my local server used to run mail/web/dns and anything else I felt like providing at the time. I moved these things to a virtual server, and it has been great. I don't have to worry when the power goes out here, that I'm missing mail. When I move places, I can disconnect my server and leave it off, to be reconnected at my leisure for when I want music, bittorrent downloads, etc.. rather than having to make it's downtime as short as possible. I can also pay a lot less a month for a shitty consumer connection from verizon or comcast, rather than having to go with someone like speakeasy so I get nice static IPs and unblocked ports.

And I'll just offer the tip out there - I believe heat is the #1 killer of hard drives. I've got another 4 disk array that is server's root. The thing ran fine for several years. Then one of the drives died. It turns out that the case fan that was blowing on that drive in particular had died. Go figure.

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned virtualization. I had a setup with 5 servers, mostly P4 based and I consolidated them down to a single Pentium D 950 box (this was early 2006) running VMware on Linux and my P4 storage server. My power bill dropped at least $50/month.

My next step will be to replace the P-D with a quadcore Core 2 CPU and replace the storage server with a SAS JBOD box attached to the VMWare server. One server, one CPU, and far less HDs, fans, and other stuff to draw power.

Wow thanks for the tips, hopefully we'll save lots of money since my bro downloads a lot 24/7.

Cool stuff. I also used the Kill a watt to measure my PC's etc.. and was surprised at the power they use even when off. My cable DVR uses 26 watts when off. Here are my results http://www.technogab.com/?p=49

wow power is expensive in california. Are you all paying people to genreate the power manually? Id invest in a hamster and a wheel or something.

I live in huntsville, alabama, and these are my electric rates:
$5.77 +
First 1,400 kWh: $0.06481 per kWh
Over 1,400 kWh: $0.07282 per kWh

Thanks Lewis, my mistake -- an updated calculator is here. http://tinyurl.com/2xfmhg

good tips, that can add up in the long run - just 5 years and you've wasted $500 - enough to buy your own solar generator.

i wrote this blog entry more than a year ago, but it has some decent info on power consumption.
http://www.energynucleus.com

Wow, I never really thought about this before. All the more reason why to buy power efficient devices and manage your power better.

Here are some additional tips.

put your dvd writer and extra hard drives in 5.25" inch hard drive enclosures. When you are not using them, turn them off.

Hibernate your computer when it's not in use. This allows you to resume exactly were you left off the next time your pc boots up.
--- for an added bonus, use one of the applications out there that allow for suspending/hibernating your computer at an exact time each day. (before you go to bed or after you have left for work.) You can also set these applicatons to turn on automatically at a certain time so that you don't that you computer can be on and ready for you to log in at a certain time (in the morning when you wake up/10 minutes before you arrive home from work each day).

Also,.. keep in mind that the average computer uses close to 20 watts even when the computer IS NOT ON! I recently verified this with a device called kill-a-watt that displayes these readings.

My current setup is to use a program to hibernate my computer after I have left for work,.. then, I have a intermec timer to shut the power off of the pc. (so that it's not still leaching 20 watts). The intermec timer goes on 30 minutes before I arrive home). I also have my bios to "power on if power loss".

Of course, it is nice to have my torrents leaching when I'm not home, so I have a low wattage mini-itx computer that runs azurieus with the speed scheduler plugin set to download only when no one is in the hosue, or everyone is sleeping.

I hope this helps!

Another thing you will notice when looking at your power bill is that you heating costs (I use gas) costs a lot more than any of my electronic devices.

Purchase a thermostat for your central heating system and set it to turn off when no one is in the house. You can turn it off at night and make use of space heaters in the sleeping locations of the house if you need or purcahse heating blankets.

My general rule of thumb is to not use the central heating unless there is 2 or more people in the house. If just 1 person is in the house, I encourage them to setup space heaters in the room they are in that have a built in thermostat to turn off when at a certain temp.

You will find that you mon-fri times of departure and arrival are about the same for everyone in the house. When you know this schedule, you can use it to turn off device/central heating at certain times of the day.

good luck!

Buy a smaller refrigerator next time and you won't have to worry about leaving your computer on. You may also be reducing your natural gas heating bill from the waste heat.

Of course, the State of California is going to solve all of our problems by disallowing the sale of incandescent light bulbs starting in 2012. That will make it even cheaper to leave our computers on. Unless, of course, they outlaw leaving your computer on.

If you live in a warm climate, the problem is even worse. Every watt of power consumed by your computing gear is turned directly into heat--heat which must be extracted from your home by your central air conditioner. Considering the typical efficiencies of A/C systems in moving heat from the inside to the outside of your home, you may well be paying more for A/C power to extract computer heat than you pay for the computer power in the first place.

have you tried downloading the free program from localcooling.com
it saves you energy on your pc and tells you how much money you have saved and how many trees and other interesting facts.

plus your helping cut down polution

wow.. most/all of you are getting HAMMERED on your power cost.. 0.05057$/KWh here

the cost of reading this blog post...you have wasted thousands of dollars of billable hours of the people reading this blog...you can't be serious about this...$200!!????! come on man put a donate button on your blog I will help out if things are rough

One problem for your electric bill is that you live in California. Your electricity is over twice as expensive as electricity is in Virginia. In Virginia, electricity is 5.61 cents per kWh and during the summer it is 6.90 cents per kWh.

Thanks for the info, I hadn't thought too deeply about the desktop computer I have that's always on. I heard they were pretty energy efficient, so I put it out of mind. Knowing an estimate of how much it costs to keep it on even when I'm not using it will end up in the computer being off most of the time I'm not using it now.

"If you cannot afford the $200 to leave your computers on, then you will not be able to afford the computer, internet connection and software that you will need to operate the computer in the first place."

ha ha. Hey enzo, if you cannot afford to send me a check for $200 every year, then you cannot afford your computer and you should sell it and cancel your internet connection and sell everything you own...

Why can't some people understand it is NOT just about $200. It's one of the steps towards saving our planet/OURSELFS. And you american people should know about climate changes, because you have some problems with weather in this times, don't you?

And yes, computer "eats" quite a lot energy when it is off... switch on the PSU is your friend...

don't forget to unplug all those little wall warts when you're not using them. 2-5 watts 24 hours a day * # of wall warts adds up

Guys. How much money do you spend for beer? 16$ per month from computer in any saving never will 0$.
My point is: save money on unnecessary stuff. One less double-mak per month.
And good idea replace ALL bulbs at home to fluorescent it save 4 time energy. And sometimes turn off unnecessary light.

R.Watkins says energy consumption should be quoted in terms of power used by a lightbulb... and that an average lightbulb is 60 watts. Ummm, does anybody really buy 60 watt bulbs? I mostly buy 100 watt bulbs. I checked at work, and with friends and family... all 100 watts, only 60 watt except in lights that REALLY need it... I guess everybody I know is an energy hog.

Oh, by the way... I lied, sort of. 8 of the 27 lights in my home are compact fluorescents... but the other 19 will NOT accept a CF bulb because the lower part of a dang CF bulb is larger than an incandescent. So, 17 bulbs are 100 watt incandescent, 2 are 600 watt, and 8 are CF equivelent of 100 watt.

Nuff said... sorry to rant at you, Bob...

I underclock my computers when I don't need full speed but also unlike conventional powermanagers I underclock the graphics card too. My G5 has its graphics card underclocked by about 25% currently and it's using much less power. I really only bump the graphics back up for games now so if you have a graphics card that can be manipulated in such a way then that's a nice way to save some power but keep your superior hardware.

Wow i guess it really varies where you live, i live in western mass we pay 0.26kwh alot more than most of you people, but i guess thats what most people are saying new england pays the most in the country.

i should mention that its 0.13 for the actual electricity and 0.13 for the distribution fee, effectively $0.26 which is outrageous in my opinion.

"If you cannot afford the $200 to leave your computers on, then you will not be able to afford the computer, internet connection and software that you will need to operate the computer in the first place."

That's ignorant nonsense. A used computer, if a few years old, is still going to be great for email/web stuff yet will be between free and inexpensive. Some organizations give them freely to disabled or elderly folk; some people give them to poor family/friends. A person can run Free Software for the OS/apps, and there are plenty of affordable ISP options out there. Doesn't everyone know that?

Anyone that is disabled and on SSI can see $200 as a tiny fortune, but Internet access ranks up there just below food for us. Often it's the best chance to interact with others (or contribute to society, or gain higher education), for the same reasons we're not employed: either we're too unwell, or the community has obstacles most people couldn't pass, or both.

If $200 is nothing for you, like someone else said, give it to another person or organization that can really use those funds. Oh, and try to educate yourself about how others live...your comment made you sound a lot more ignorant (or immature) than you probably are.

To the person that wrote the article: thank you. Not just for the post, but the great tips that followed in comments. Anyone that is curious about the disability community online, I've put a great blog's URL (not mine) in the website field.

I wish power management worked worth a crap on my 2005 Toshiba laptop. More than half the time when it comes out of standby, the Wi-Fi connection is lost (says it's connected but isn't). Sometimes I can get POP mail but not Web, sometimes the other way around, sometimes neither. Repairing the connection doesn't usually work. I end up rebooting.

heh heh, jeff's two-year-old post got life-haxored!

http://www.lifehacker.com/software/energy-conservation/determine-and-lower-the-cost-of-leaving-your-pc-running-237884.php

It's disturbing how high electricity bills get. I performed a test and found that with no A/C or heater, and no light other than one single bulb lamp in the room I occupy plus using my laptop and the TV I still had a bill of $260. That is still cheaper than the $380 from last month, but still it's a lot to pay for an apartment with NO A/C or heater.

-Bobby

Anony said: "that $600k price tag is a HOUSE in the WORST Area."

I beg to differ. This is a common misconception, and while it is true that there are plenty of million-dollar houses in the Bay Area, it doesn't mean that $600K only buys a pit.
My two-bedroom bungalow with a plot of land and a garage, in a quiet, friendly, safe neighborhood near the Rose Garden in San Jose only cost $560K at the end of 2005 (BEFORE housing prices started to go down).

If you want 3,000 square feet, 4 bedrooms, a bathroom with jacuzzi that's bigger than most bedrooms, and a three-car garage... well, yes, you'll need to bring a million dollars or more to the table. But while some people are concerned about the cost of running their computer 24/7, they should be more concerned about the size and inefficiency of their house and the cost to keep it climate controlled.

Cost is one thing, but it's also good for the environment to conserve energy. Let saving $ motivate you but have helping the environment be your reason to conserve energy.

I have been designing a home server that will be on 24/7. Power draw is critical (as is quiet operation while idle), but cost is also important. If I had ~$1000, I would simply buy a Synology NAS server (which only draws 18W when idle). But, I figure I can make a more versatile system for ~$750. AMD's new CPUs have a Cool 'n' Quiet mode, where they drop down to very low powers when idle (like 4W). Right now I am evaluating ClarkConnect as the OS - it looks like it will do the job nicely.

So I am using some old hardware I have lying around until I finalize the design (a 2400 Athlon XP). Originally, it drew 190W on idle. Between disabling some unused parallel ports, on-board sound, under-clocking the CPU, I reduced it to 130W. Replacing the ATI 9700 Pro AIW with a cheap PCI video card saved another 40W - I am now at around 80W on idle (with only 1 drive though).

Look for a 80-plus Power Supply ( http://www.80plus.org/). Typical PSUs are only ~60% efficient, which means that 200W go in, but only 120W actually do anything useful for you. With an 80%+ PSU, you only need 150W input (savings of around 50W/yr = ~$60, more than the cost of the PSU. Newegg has the SeaSonic S12-330 ATX12V 330W for only $55.

I am all for conservation. $$ is not the real issue. What if I have kids?

For those not running a server or DVR, remember standby mode consumes WAY less power, and mine only takes a few secs to come back to life.

Think of everything you do being magnified throughout the course of years.

It used to be that the big things mattered most (fridge, washer, heating, etc.) and while they still do matter a lot, especially older appliances and electric heaters, we now live in the gadget age, and the tiny stuff is adding up big time.

We are paying about 0.25 Kwh here in California- it is confusing since the peak is charged at the highest rate. Ouch! Maybe $$ really is an issue too.

Funny how this older thread is hot again!

Why not just turn off your computer when you're not using it?

"Why not just turn off your computer when you're not using it?"
Good Point. If what your running on your computer isn't 100% necessary, turn the damn thing off.

CyBear,

When I bought my last house, it had 100W bulbs everywhere.
I first replaced them with 40W bulbs, and guess what. They were brighter. The 100's got dark over time because of the heat!

I replaced about 20 100W bulbs with 14w CF bulbs where they were just turn on/off situations, and the dimming outlets all have 40W incandecents, which is actually enough light.

I don't need it super bright, it just makes ugly people even uglier ;)

so I'm guessing if I have at least 2 pcs, 1 server, and and HD DVR on all the time I'm probably wasting a lot of energy/money...?

Jesus Christ. 15 cents per kilowatt hour back in '05?!?!?! I'm on a fixed plan at 7 cents.

I'm surprised no one here has mentioned true energy consumption which is way more important than money. A 65 watt computer left running full time consumes a barrel of oil (equivalent) in a year. 5,500,000 btu/barrel / 10,000 btu/kwh / 8760 hrs/year = 63 watts.

So just go get yourself a Mac Mini. It uses about 10-15 watts, way less energy than the 75 watt new Dual Core desktop which I sent packing (to a customer who wanted one).

Leave in on and it sleeps at less than a watt. The other ran 10 watts in sleep mode. What's wrong with this picture?

Bonus? My new Mac Mini Dual Core is faster on XP than my other new desktop was on Vista.

How come CRT is double usage of power than LCD ?

To the guy who said that you should be pulling down $140k in Santa Clara and then $200k/yr within five years. What are you smoking?! Very experienced software developers don't pull down $140k in most places in the bay area. The median income in the bay is something like $50k or $60k and a good programming will make about six figures (give or take a little). They're certainly not going to be pulling down $200k.

And the cost of living is actually much higher in the bay than anywhere else. For one thing, you have sales taxes which are about 9%. In Oregon, you have no sales tax. In California, state income tax is about 9.3% and in Denver, it's 4.62%. Then you have electricity, which starts around twelve cents per kwH versus about 6 or 7 cents in Denver and Portland.

Then, of course, gas is more expensive and you go through a lot more gas because travel time is a couple hours in each direction and you spend a lot more time just sitting idle in your car on the freeway. And then there's the extra taxes levied on your vehicle just for owning a vehicle.

There's a reason BURGER FLIPPERS start out at ten bucks an hour in the bay area.

"I am all for conservation. $$ is not the real issue. What if I have kids?"

Huh? That paragraph makes no sense. So what if you have kids...?

Very Cool! You can really save energy with just about anything. Have a spare guest room? Unplug everything in it when not in use, turn off the vents and shut the door, will save you a nice chunk. I've always figured anything that runs 24 hours a day (like a plug in clock) costs about $1 a watt a year. Battery power clocks are cheaper!

I run about 8 computers 24/7 in my home. The rest of them only when needed. I do not have a problem with their utility bill especially during the cold weather time. They are simply helping the heater in the house. What my point is, half the time you keep your computer on, will be saving you money on your heating bill.
Just a point to make you feel a bit better if you leave your computer on 24/7.

I run about 8 computers 24/7 in my home. The rest of them only when needed. I do not have a problem with their utility bill especially during the cold weather time. They are simply helping the heater in the house. What my point is, half the time you keep your computer on, will be saving you money on your heating bill.
Just a point to make you feel a bit better if you leave your computer on 24/7.

This article needs updating.....
Latest PC's suck down a lot of power. Latest graphics card sucks about twice that of CPU on full load. AMD X2 6000+ would use 120W on full load, whereas 2900XT will use around 350W.

Best advise - figure out what the ultimate goal of your PC is:
Games - get latest rig and turn it off whenever you're not playing.
ghaphic processing/design etc - as a above.
Browsing internet - get yourself a laptop. latest laptops would use about 20-25Watts on peak load (you heard it).

I have been playing around with low power computers the past year.

The Mini ITX computers with a DC-DC power converter are nice, just use about 20 watts max for the whole system.

I also got some of the gOS motherboards and built systems with them using high efficient power supples, they draw 40 watts when running normally, 60 watts when booting from the DVD drive. I think that not all of the power saving features of the system are turned on, hoping to half this watt rating with the system in idle and the drives spun down.

The decTOP was really cool. I replaced the drives inside of it with 1 or 2 GB solid state drives. The system only draws 4 watts when running, 6 watts when booting. It was a touch slow though. With a high high efficient monitor of some kind I bet you could run a complete computer system 24/7 for free with a single solar panel and a big battery or two.

Surprisingly I loaded Linux on some old Compaq IA-1's, little computers with attached LCD monitors and the complete system only drew 13 watts when the screen was on, or 9 watts with the screen off. Unfortunately the system requires a standard wall plug-in or it would be perfect for solar power. As is you'd lose some efficiency inverting the DC volts to 110 AC for the device.

Just wanted to say their are the hidden costs that you also need to think about when saving money on the power bill, but having to recoup the fees for the investment. The ultimate hidden cost is the environment, how much was it costing us to have your big server in the closet running? Oh about 2000tons of co2 per year.. So thank you for going green! Even though we are not charged for the co2 we put in the air we are going to pay the price in some manner. On that note I want to say that the ozone layer is more important as it is now we could pump more co2 in the environment without temperature change, but its just not good to have the co2 their if we lose more ozone then we will gain more heat.. But their are other scary things that could happy like a run-away effect, or cacade effect higher barometric pressure for instance leading to less rain cause water is not evaporating..

I do not mean to contradict you paul, but I have to add a comment about what you siad reguarding the MRI machines...

"typically about *1700 liters* of liquid helium. guess how much electricity it takes to keep that in a liquid state? huge amounts."

If you know anything about chemistry, which I am going to assume you do not from your statement, if you takes Charles or Boyle's gas laws which state ...

Charles law (At constant pressure, the volume of a given mass of an ideal gas increases or decreases by the same factor as its temperature (in kelvin) increases or decreases. )

Boyle's Law which deals with pressure vs volume in a closed system,

Anyway, if a hospital has an MRI machine and places the helium in a closed system with a high amount of pressure, the helium will naturally revert to a liquid state eventually. So what will this basic early 1900 marvel of chemistry gas laws cost the hospital or medical facility to run a liquid helium colling system...... Nothing.. NADA.. ZIP.... this phenomenon that I am talking about is seen in almost everything. You computer wizzes use a can of compressed air shake it and at the cost of no electricity there is liquid oxygen in the can. Go outside to your BBQ and shake the propane tank. Again liguid propane under pressure.

The only cost a hospital does incure while running this system is compressor. When the "liquid gas" passes through the heated area it is expanded into a bigger pipe. this allows the liquid to draw the heat. The compressor then forces the gas to a smaller pipe where it again condenses. So the cost of cooling an MRI machine is no different then using a common airconditioner, refridgerator, or any other cooling device that uses a compressor.

The reason for using "helium" is it is a small inert element and therefore will move faster causing more collisions in the container, drawing away more heat. However the compressor will move it to the smaller area, having it again release the heat. That is why your airconditioner is kicking out heat on the other side. Basically what I am saying in a nut shell is it does not matter what type of gas you have in a closed cooling system you will stilluse the same amount of electricity and the only thing drawing power is the compressor and maybe a fan if it is not direct like you car engine/anti freeze

It is interesting reading the comment list here - there is such a disparity between those who "get" the whole greenhouse gas emission problem, and those who just don't "get" it (or who turn their minds off whenever it is mentioned).

We were discussing in the office whether some of the opinions and stories presented in a forum like this, reflected the statistics presented in data like this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita

It's fun to play with the numbers a bit. For example, if we assume an average of about 1kg carbon dioxide emission per 1kWh, that means that Jeff's server's emissions alone are higher than the lowest 78 countries' per capita emissions!

Kind of explains why other countries get a bit narky with America sometimes.

Thanks alot for the insight.

My electricity bill is the lowest of all my bills. Cable/Internet bill is higher, Phone is higher, Gasoline is higher, Heat is higher, even in the summer with AC its pretty low ($80-120/mo)

Boston MA

Spinning up the HD's takes a lot of energy (and, I assume wear and tear) on the HD. I'm not sure how *much* energy

http://bucarotechelp.com/computers/wintips/93081403.asp