> and in the meantime it reduces heat and power and disk wear. If drive-by SSH attempts - even a large number of them - are enough to have a noticeable impact

> and in the meantime it reduces heat and power and disk wear. If drive-by SSH attempts - even a large number of them - are enough to have a noticeable impact on heat/power/wear, then you should probably consider, you know, not putting hardware from 1997 on the Internet. Really doesn't take that much energy on hardware built during the current century to reject an authentication attempt and log it.