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I would love to see what the environmental impact of recycling a computer (and acquiring a new one with lower power consumption) versus buying a new one. I supp

by trangus_1985 5y ago

I would love to see what the environmental impact of recycling a computer (and acquiring a new one with lower power consumption) versus buying a new one. I suppose that makes more sense for business than home, though.

kop316 5y ago
On my thinkpad x200, I seem to use ~11-12 Watts doing normal usage. For newer laptops, what would be the expected usage?
- tpxl 5y ago
  Similar, but with a much better perf/W. That's the biggest problem with old hardware. I'd love to be able to run old servers with dual cores and such in a big cluster, but 60W for an old CPU with 10% of the performance of a similar modern CPU is just not very attractive ):
- icegreentea2 5y ago
  If you aimed for similar class (ultraportable), you're going to be in pretty much the same ballpark. Ultraportable CPUs are normally in the sub 15W (peak) now, and screens are The embodied energy of the laptop is high (estimate in the ~5GJ range) (http://conferences.sigcomm.org/hotnets/2011/papers/hotnetsX-final56.pdf http://conferences.sigcomm.org/hotnets/2011/papers/hotnetsX-...). Ballparking now... assuming 5GJ of embodied energy, 20W power draw, 100% duty cycle, you'll need to run a laptop for about 8 years for its power draw to match its embodied energy. That means that changing laptops much more frequently than that will probably result in net higher energy consumption. Obviously, the lower the power consumption gets, the longer the "payoff" period becomes - this is why servers which might have 10x the embodied energy, but >40x the power draw are still economical to have more rapid hardware refresh cycles.
  - JadeNB 5y ago
    > If you aimed for similar class (ultraportable), you're going to be in pretty much the same ballpark. Ultraportable CPUs are normally in the sub 15W (peak) now, and screens are I think this got truncated.
- zokier 5y ago
  Reading random laptop review[1] claims to get >14h usage with 55 Wh battery, putting the average below 4W. Of course what constitutes normal usage varies, but I'd guess modern laptops would easily halve the energy consumption of your vintage one. And Apples new M1 laptops are yet much more efficient. [1] https://www.notebookcheck.net/Razer-Book-13-Core-i7-Laptop-Review-Like-an-XPS-13-But-Faster.508474.0.html#toc-energy-management https://www.notebookcheck.net/Razer-Book-13-Core-i7-Laptop-R...

kop316 5y ago

On my thinkpad x200, I seem to use ~11-12 Watts doing normal usage. For newer laptops, what would be the expected usage?

tpxl 5y ago
Similar, but with a much better perf/W. That's the biggest problem with old hardware. I'd love to be able to run old servers with dual cores and such in a big cluster, but 60W for an old CPU with 10% of the performance of a similar modern CPU is just not very attractive ):
icegreentea2 5y ago
If you aimed for similar class (ultraportable), you're going to be in pretty much the same ballpark. Ultraportable CPUs are normally in the sub 15W (peak) now, and screens are The embodied energy of the laptop is high (estimate in the ~5GJ range) (http://conferences.sigcomm.org/hotnets/2011/papers/hotnetsX-final56.pdf http://conferences.sigcomm.org/hotnets/2011/papers/hotnetsX-...). Ballparking now... assuming 5GJ of embodied energy, 20W power draw, 100% duty cycle, you'll need to run a laptop for about 8 years for its power draw to match its embodied energy. That means that changing laptops much more frequently than that will probably result in net higher energy consumption. Obviously, the lower the power consumption gets, the longer the "payoff" period becomes - this is why servers which might have 10x the embodied energy, but >40x the power draw are still economical to have more rapid hardware refresh cycles.
- JadeNB 5y ago
  > If you aimed for similar class (ultraportable), you're going to be in pretty much the same ballpark. Ultraportable CPUs are normally in the sub 15W (peak) now, and screens are I think this got truncated.
zokier 5y ago
Reading random laptop review[1] claims to get >14h usage with 55 Wh battery, putting the average below 4W. Of course what constitutes normal usage varies, but I'd guess modern laptops would easily halve the energy consumption of your vintage one. And Apples new M1 laptops are yet much more efficient. [1] https://www.notebookcheck.net/Razer-Book-13-Core-i7-Laptop-Review-Like-an-XPS-13-But-Faster.508474.0.html#toc-energy-management https://www.notebookcheck.net/Razer-Book-13-Core-i7-Laptop-R...