4 ms·

There were devices that consumed 80 watts in standby. I have a cabinet full of equipment including my cable modem, a computer (server, no monitor) with 8 mechan

There were devices that consumed 80 watts in standby. I have a cabinet full of equipment including my cable modem, a computer (server, no monitor) with 8 mechanical hard drives. The idle current is 76 watts or so. How could something be so high?

yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
It's easy to burn energy when nobody's paying it any attention. Mostly by not really idling, I suspect
londons_explore 4y ago
Audio amplifiers, especially old ones, can easily draw 100 watts when on 'standby' - ie. the amplifier is turned on but playing no sound.
- sidewndr46 4y ago
  If it is a class A amplifier, I think that would make sense. But how many people have huge class A amplifiers for their home audio?
  - londons_explore 4y ago
    Old ones... Everything from the 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's... Remember in europe we have a lot more old stuff - especially old houses that are family owned for 100+ years tend not to have things replaced often unless they're unrepairable. Even modern class D amps can be 30+ watts when not playing anything tho.
    - eternityforest 4y ago
      That's interesting, I've never thought of people with old houses correlating with old tech.
  - thulle 4y ago
    > If it is a class A amplifier, I think that would make sense. The much more standard class AB still uses 25% with no output, 100 W idle would be a stereo 200 W amplifier. Or a 5x 80 W surround amplifier.
- type0 4y ago
  > 'standby' - ie. the amplifier is turned on but playing no sound. this isn't standby and is a good way for your vintage amp to become defective
londons_explore 4y ago
'standby' for many devices used to mean 'leave all the electronics powered up, but turn the screen/sound off'.
- thakoppno 4y ago
  the screen is the primary consumer of energy. i don’t know but imagine sound is likely more hungry in that regard than any of the other discrete systems on a smart tv. edit: additionally tvs that don’t turn off are in some cases of limited utility.
- lizknope 4y ago
  I had a DirecTV satellite receiver with DVR. They rolled out an update and made a big deal their new "Energy Star ECO power savings mode." I wondered how much power it could really save because it was a DVR with a spinning hard drive that would always record the last 30 minutes of the current channel even if you didn't set it to record anything explicitly. So I measured it while on and also in "power savings mode" where the video output was off. 14.5W when on and 14.0W when in "power savings mode" What a joke.
  - koolba 4y ago
    > 14.5W when on and 14.0W when in "power savings mode" A software upgrade that saves 3% across hundreds of thousands of people doesn’t seem that pointless in the aggregate.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
Someone 4y ago
Cable modems and servers weren’t designed for standby. Also, if we’re talking consumer tech from the 1970’s or 1980’s, I think it’s twofold. Firstly, the market cared more about “time to wake up” than about power usage. People had fewer devices, they were (relatively) more expensive, and people were used to fully switching off stuff, so standby power usage wasn’t seen as a big issue. Secondly, the tech itself didn’t exist. Nowadays, your power supply has a CPU that knows how much power your hardware needs and can optimize for it. Then, you would be lucky if your hardware had a switching power supply. CPUs didn’t have power states. If you were lucky, you could halt them and have them start again on interrupt. Hibernation didn’t exist, so in computers you’d have to power RAM, anyways. And because of that, OSes didn’t bother with the complex task of properly powering down peripherals when going on standby.
- sidewndr46 4y ago
  What power supply has CPU in it?
  - hug 4y ago
    Every macbook power supply from who knows when does. Here's a teardown of a 2015 macbook pro charger that includes a Texas Instruments MSP430. https://www.righto.com/2015/11/macbook-charger-teardown-surprising.html https://www.righto.com/2015/11/macbook-charger-teardown-surp...
    - sidewndr46 4y ago
      That's a microcontroller.
      - hug 4y ago
        > The MSP430 is a mixed-signal microcontroller family from Texas Instruments, first introduced on 14 February 1992.[1] Built around a 16-bit CPU From Wikipedia. Emphasis mine.
- barrkel 4y ago
xani_ 4y ago
You mean idle "server turned on but not used" or completely off ? Servers usually have out of bands management builtin and that's on all the time, even if management network is not connected. Should be just few watts tho
- sidewndr46 4y ago
  Running but not really doing anything. No IO, no CPU activity, etc.
thedrbrian 4y ago
Not tellies but an interesting look by Dave Jones[of EEVBLOG fame] into how/why simple devices can use up so much power when idle. A lot of it is down to lazy design of the AC>DC circuits https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kI8ySvNPdQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kI8ySvNPdQ
- toxik 4y ago
  It’s not lazy, it’s cost optimized. Like so many times, market forces just force any externalities outside the price signal.

yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago

It's easy to burn energy when nobody's paying it any attention. Mostly by not really idling, I suspect

londons_explore 4y ago

Audio amplifiers, especially old ones, can easily draw 100 watts when on 'standby' - ie. the amplifier is turned on but playing no sound.

sidewndr46 4y ago
If it is a class A amplifier, I think that would make sense. But how many people have huge class A amplifiers for their home audio?
- londons_explore 4y ago
  Old ones... Everything from the 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's... Remember in europe we have a lot more old stuff - especially old houses that are family owned for 100+ years tend not to have things replaced often unless they're unrepairable. Even modern class D amps can be 30+ watts when not playing anything tho.
  - eternityforest 4y ago
    That's interesting, I've never thought of people with old houses correlating with old tech.
- thulle 4y ago
  > If it is a class A amplifier, I think that would make sense. The much more standard class AB still uses 25% with no output, 100 W idle would be a stereo 200 W amplifier. Or a 5x 80 W surround amplifier.
type0 4y ago
> 'standby' - ie. the amplifier is turned on but playing no sound. this isn't standby and is a good way for your vintage amp to become defective

londons_explore 4y ago

'standby' for many devices used to mean 'leave all the electronics powered up, but turn the screen/sound off'.

thakoppno 4y ago
the screen is the primary consumer of energy. i don’t know but imagine sound is likely more hungry in that regard than any of the other discrete systems on a smart tv. edit: additionally tvs that don’t turn off are in some cases of limited utility.
lizknope 4y ago
I had a DirecTV satellite receiver with DVR. They rolled out an update and made a big deal their new "Energy Star ECO power savings mode." I wondered how much power it could really save because it was a DVR with a spinning hard drive that would always record the last 30 minutes of the current channel even if you didn't set it to record anything explicitly. So I measured it while on and also in "power savings mode" where the video output was off. 14.5W when on and 14.0W when in "power savings mode" What a joke.
- koolba 4y ago
  > 14.5W when on and 14.0W when in "power savings mode" A software upgrade that saves 3% across hundreds of thousands of people doesn’t seem that pointless in the aggregate.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

Someone 4y ago

Cable modems and servers weren’t designed for standby. Also, if we’re talking consumer tech from the 1970’s or 1980’s, I think it’s twofold. Firstly, the market cared more about “time to wake up” than about power usage. People had fewer devices, they were (relatively) more expensive, and people were used to fully switching off stuff, so standby power usage wasn’t seen as a big issue. Secondly, the tech itself didn’t exist. Nowadays, your power supply has a CPU that knows how much power your hardware needs and can optimize for it. Then, you would be lucky if your hardware had a switching power supply. CPUs didn’t have power states. If you were lucky, you could halt them and have them start again on interrupt. Hibernation didn’t exist, so in computers you’d have to power RAM, anyways. And because of that, OSes didn’t bother with the complex task of properly powering down peripherals when going on standby.

sidewndr46 4y ago
What power supply has CPU in it?
- hug 4y ago
  Every macbook power supply from who knows when does. Here's a teardown of a 2015 macbook pro charger that includes a Texas Instruments MSP430. https://www.righto.com/2015/11/macbook-charger-teardown-surprising.html https://www.righto.com/2015/11/macbook-charger-teardown-surp...
  - sidewndr46 4y ago
    That's a microcontroller.
    - hug 4y ago
      > The MSP430 is a mixed-signal microcontroller family from Texas Instruments, first introduced on 14 February 1992.[1] Built around a 16-bit CPU From Wikipedia. Emphasis mine.
barrkel 4y ago

xani_ 4y ago

You mean idle "server turned on but not used" or completely off ? Servers usually have out of bands management builtin and that's on all the time, even if management network is not connected. Should be just few watts tho

sidewndr46 4y ago
Running but not really doing anything. No IO, no CPU activity, etc.

thedrbrian 4y ago

Not tellies but an interesting look by Dave Jones[of EEVBLOG fame] into how/why simple devices can use up so much power when idle. A lot of it is down to lazy design of the AC>DC circuits https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kI8ySvNPdQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kI8ySvNPdQ

toxik 4y ago
It’s not lazy, it’s cost optimized. Like so many times, market forces just force any externalities outside the price signal.