3 ms·

> E.g. a desktop PC might clock in at 100W when unused depending on the components 100W when unused! What on earth causes that? My laptop draws 100W under full

> E.g. a desktop PC might clock in at 100W when unused depending on the components 100W when unused! What on earth causes that? My laptop draws 100W under full load.

Y-bar 5y ago
My 9700K desktop draws 45-50W (excluding monitor) when idle. Main usage is: - GPU at about 11-15W - Fans on motherboard and case 7-10W - Disks (1 HDD, 2xSSD): 5-10W - Peripherals (keyboard, mouse, headset, ...) 2-5W - CPU 5-15W I can imagine a scenario with additional peripherals, beefier GPU, more PCI cards, more disks could absolutely reach upwards to 100W.
- ascagnel_ 5y ago
  What power level is the system at? That sounds reasonable for a system that's in its active mode (ACPI S0) but not under load, but would be extremely high for any other sleep mode (S1-S5).
  - Y-bar 5y ago
    I have never been able to consistently get Windows 10 to enter deep sleep for more than about 30 minutes, there is always something waking it up. So I have given up and try to remember to shut the computer off when not using it.
    - ascagnel_ 5y ago
      That sounds like you've got some scheduled task firing too frequently. These commands may help diagnose the system wakes: - powercfg/lastwake (report what event/device last woke the system) - powercfg/waketimers (tasks set to wake the system) If those don't report the culprit, it could also be a hardware device: - powercfg -devicequery wake_armed (enumerate devices able to wake the system)
Gigachad 5y ago
Gaming desktops are extremely inefficient. My new AMD GPU claims to be using 30w while at 0% utilization. You also have all the fans which don't turn of when they really could half the time. As well as often multiple hard drives plugged in. It's just that no one really cares about power usage on a desktop because its plugged in and doesn't cost all that much if you turn it off while not using it. I think modern windows may even try to automatically suspend the system to actually turn the gpu and fans off.
- nicoburns 5y ago
  Ok, so we're talking more like on-but-idle rather in sleep mode? Still seems like a lot, but more reasonable.
- outworlder 5y ago
  Utilization is never 0% though. There's a lot of housekeeping activities that prevent components from being powered down. They do care about desktops, but not as much as laptops obviously. It's all about compromises. Fans don't draw very much at low speeds, but you can turn most off (except the CPU fans unless you have a large heatsink).
thescriptkiddie 5y ago
Hard drives and monitors, mostly.
- thescriptkiddie 5y ago
  Also RAM. 32 GiB of (non-LP) DDR4 will consume around 10 watts constantly, regardless of load, and DDR3 was twice that.

> E.g. a desktop PC might clock in at 100W when unused depending on the components 100W when unused! What on earth causes that? My laptop draws 100W under full load.

Y-bar 5y ago

My 9700K desktop draws 45-50W (excluding monitor) when idle. Main usage is: - GPU at about 11-15W - Fans on motherboard and case 7-10W - Disks (1 HDD, 2xSSD): 5-10W - Peripherals (keyboard, mouse, headset, ...) 2-5W - CPU 5-15W I can imagine a scenario with additional peripherals, beefier GPU, more PCI cards, more disks could absolutely reach upwards to 100W.

ascagnel_ 5y ago
What power level is the system at? That sounds reasonable for a system that's in its active mode (ACPI S0) but not under load, but would be extremely high for any other sleep mode (S1-S5).
- Y-bar 5y ago
  I have never been able to consistently get Windows 10 to enter deep sleep for more than about 30 minutes, there is always something waking it up. So I have given up and try to remember to shut the computer off when not using it.
  - ascagnel_ 5y ago
    That sounds like you've got some scheduled task firing too frequently. These commands may help diagnose the system wakes: - powercfg/lastwake (report what event/device last woke the system) - powercfg/waketimers (tasks set to wake the system) If those don't report the culprit, it could also be a hardware device: - powercfg -devicequery wake_armed (enumerate devices able to wake the system)

Gigachad 5y ago

Gaming desktops are extremely inefficient. My new AMD GPU claims to be using 30w while at 0% utilization. You also have all the fans which don't turn of when they really could half the time. As well as often multiple hard drives plugged in. It's just that no one really cares about power usage on a desktop because its plugged in and doesn't cost all that much if you turn it off while not using it. I think modern windows may even try to automatically suspend the system to actually turn the gpu and fans off.

nicoburns 5y ago
Ok, so we're talking more like on-but-idle rather in sleep mode? Still seems like a lot, but more reasonable.
outworlder 5y ago
Utilization is never 0% though. There's a lot of housekeeping activities that prevent components from being powered down. They do care about desktops, but not as much as laptops obviously. It's all about compromises. Fans don't draw very much at low speeds, but you can turn most off (except the CPU fans unless you have a large heatsink).

thescriptkiddie 5y ago

Hard drives and monitors, mostly.

thescriptkiddie 5y ago
Also RAM. 32 GiB of (non-LP) DDR4 will consume around 10 watts constantly, regardless of load, and DDR3 was twice that.