4 ms·

That headless quad-core intel mini PC uses more energy sitting idle than my entire 8C/16T AMD framework laptop sitting idle, including powering the display.

markhahn 2y ago
isn't that expected? or do you mean "I'd buy a minipc designed like a laptop"?
- craftkiller 2y ago
  If I wanted another minipc, I'd be looking for one designed like a laptop. The vast majority of consumer computers spend most of their time idle, even when it is something we are directly interacting with at the time (like laptops). In my experience, this is even more true for minipcs. I'm wondering what magic has gone into laptops and hasn't made it into electron guzzlers like the intel minipc in this article.
ThrowawayTestr 2y ago
At full power running 24/7 (12V*3A) at 10cents/kwh, the mini PC uses $36 of electricity. Who cares how much power it uses.
- cardanome 2y ago
  Here in Germany it is more like 40cents/kwh so that is some serious money down the drain for some people.
  - jrmg 2y ago
    There isn’t anywhere in the US that has 10cents/kwh residential power either (though there are a few places that are close): https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.php?t=epmt_5_6_a https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.ph...
    - yau8edq12i 2y ago
      And perhaps we shouldn't just blindly waste energy just because it happens to be cheap.
      - ThrowawayTestr 2y ago
        I think worrying about a few dollars when the performance difference is 2x at minimum is dumb.
        craftkiller 2y ago
        It depends on your use-case. If I was making a file server then idle power consumption is all that matters because both of these machines will saturate a gigabit ethernet link[0] and a home file server is going to be idle 90+% of the time. If I was making a build server instead then I'd actually be using the additional CPU capacity. [0] actually I wouldn't use either of these machines for a file server due to the lack of ECC, but you get the point.
    - helf 2y ago
      [dead]
- flounder3 2y ago
  PG&E in California is 4-6x+. I care. https://www.pge.com/assets/pge/docs/account/rate-plans/residential-electric-rate-plan-pricing.pdf.coredownload.pdf https://www.pge.com/assets/pge/docs/account/rate-plans/resid...
kayodelycaon 2y ago
A desktop system doesn't need to optimize idle power. So I'm willing to bet none of the components (cough intel) was picked for their low idle power consumption. :)
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
paxys 2y ago
I find that very hard to believe considering the N100 has a TDP of 6W and in benchmarks draws <8W when idle. Ryzen 5 7640U's numbers are 5x that. The laptop's display itself will consume more energy than the entire mini PC on idle.
- craftkiller 2y ago
  From powertop sitting idle running sway, waybar, and alacritty: > The battery reports a discharge rate of 6.34 W Plenty of people have hit even lower levels, and there are plenty of reports of people getting approximately the same as me: https://community.frame.work/t/tracking-ppd-v-tlp-for-amd-ryzen-7040/39423/195 https://community.frame.work/t/tracking-ppd-v-tlp-for-amd-ry... The Intel PC in the article is listed as 7-10W idle, which puts my full laptop below its lowest bound.
  - kube-system 2y ago
    One of the comments on the article's page: > I managed to get my N100 mini pc to 1.3-1.5W idle power consumption at wall There's a lot of variables at play with idle power consumption, so the devil is in the details with what is actually being compared.
    - paxys 2y ago
      Plus the manufacturer published TDP numbers are with a baseline load, not 100% idle and as optimized as possible (because at that point you might as well turn the device off).
      - kube-system 2y ago
        If I'm reading this correctly, I think the article is citing 'typical' (i.e. what other people said) idle power consumption measured at the wall for similar N100 PCs. TDP something different: it is typically a term to describe the amount of heat that needs to be dissipated from a chip while under load. While it is a number that is closely related to the power consumption, it is neither the same thing, nor would those numbers ever cite the total consumption of the system. (because, for instance, most components in a computer are passively cooled)
kube-system 2y ago
How are you measuring that?
- craftkiller 2y ago
  Running powertop on battery while sitting idle running sway, waybar, and alacritty with my "brightness" setting set to 85/255 but my amdgpu.abmlevel is set to 3 which reduced the "actual_brightness" to ~27/255
  - kube-system 2y ago
    PowerTOP estimates your power consumption, it does not actually measure it. Also, this neglects AC/DC power conversion loss. For a more accurate apples-to-apples comparison, disconnect the battery and use an actual power meter (e.g. Kill-a-watt) at the AC adapter.
    - craftkiller 2y ago
      powertop is just relaying whatever value my laptop's battery is reporting for current+voltage, read from sysfs[0]. Are you suggesting my laptop's battery is merely estimating current and/or voltage? I don't know much about the hardware in my laptop's battery, and I'm not succeeding in finding information online, but I'm going to need a source to believe that considering how trivial it would be for the battery to report real values for current and voltage. Regardless, your point about AC/DC conversion losses is good considering the article almost certainly was measuring from AC seeing as how it doesn't have a battery. [0] https://github.com/fenrus75/powertop/blob/master/src/measurement/sysfs.cpp https://github.com/fenrus75/powertop/blob/master/src/measure...

markhahn 2y ago

isn't that expected? or do you mean "I'd buy a minipc designed like a laptop"?

craftkiller 2y ago
If I wanted another minipc, I'd be looking for one designed like a laptop. The vast majority of consumer computers spend most of their time idle, even when it is something we are directly interacting with at the time (like laptops). In my experience, this is even more true for minipcs. I'm wondering what magic has gone into laptops and hasn't made it into electron guzzlers like the intel minipc in this article.

ThrowawayTestr 2y ago

At full power running 24/7 (12V*3A) at 10cents/kwh, the mini PC uses $36 of electricity. Who cares how much power it uses.

cardanome 2y ago
Here in Germany it is more like 40cents/kwh so that is some serious money down the drain for some people.
- jrmg 2y ago
  There isn’t anywhere in the US that has 10cents/kwh residential power either (though there are a few places that are close): https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.php?t=epmt_5_6_a https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.ph...
  - yau8edq12i 2y ago
    And perhaps we shouldn't just blindly waste energy just because it happens to be cheap.
    - ThrowawayTestr 2y ago
      I think worrying about a few dollars when the performance difference is 2x at minimum is dumb.
      - craftkiller 2y ago
        It depends on your use-case. If I was making a file server then idle power consumption is all that matters because both of these machines will saturate a gigabit ethernet link[0] and a home file server is going to be idle 90+% of the time. If I was making a build server instead then I'd actually be using the additional CPU capacity. [0] actually I wouldn't use either of these machines for a file server due to the lack of ECC, but you get the point.
  - helf 2y ago
    [dead]
flounder3 2y ago
PG&E in California is 4-6x+. I care. https://www.pge.com/assets/pge/docs/account/rate-plans/residential-electric-rate-plan-pricing.pdf.coredownload.pdf https://www.pge.com/assets/pge/docs/account/rate-plans/resid...

kayodelycaon 2y ago

A desktop system doesn't need to optimize idle power. So I'm willing to bet none of the components (cough intel) was picked for their low idle power consumption. :)

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

paxys 2y ago

I find that very hard to believe considering the N100 has a TDP of 6W and in benchmarks draws <8W when idle. Ryzen 5 7640U's numbers are 5x that. The laptop's display itself will consume more energy than the entire mini PC on idle.

craftkiller 2y ago
From powertop sitting idle running sway, waybar, and alacritty: > The battery reports a discharge rate of 6.34 W Plenty of people have hit even lower levels, and there are plenty of reports of people getting approximately the same as me: https://community.frame.work/t/tracking-ppd-v-tlp-for-amd-ryzen-7040/39423/195 https://community.frame.work/t/tracking-ppd-v-tlp-for-amd-ry... The Intel PC in the article is listed as 7-10W idle, which puts my full laptop below its lowest bound.
- kube-system 2y ago
  One of the comments on the article's page: > I managed to get my N100 mini pc to 1.3-1.5W idle power consumption at wall There's a lot of variables at play with idle power consumption, so the devil is in the details with what is actually being compared.
  - paxys 2y ago
    Plus the manufacturer published TDP numbers are with a baseline load, not 100% idle and as optimized as possible (because at that point you might as well turn the device off).
    - kube-system 2y ago
      If I'm reading this correctly, I think the article is citing 'typical' (i.e. what other people said) idle power consumption measured at the wall for similar N100 PCs. TDP something different: it is typically a term to describe the amount of heat that needs to be dissipated from a chip while under load. While it is a number that is closely related to the power consumption, it is neither the same thing, nor would those numbers ever cite the total consumption of the system. (because, for instance, most components in a computer are passively cooled)

kube-system 2y ago

How are you measuring that?

craftkiller 2y ago
Running powertop on battery while sitting idle running sway, waybar, and alacritty with my "brightness" setting set to 85/255 but my amdgpu.abmlevel is set to 3 which reduced the "actual_brightness" to ~27/255
- kube-system 2y ago
  PowerTOP estimates your power consumption, it does not actually measure it. Also, this neglects AC/DC power conversion loss. For a more accurate apples-to-apples comparison, disconnect the battery and use an actual power meter (e.g. Kill-a-watt) at the AC adapter.
  - craftkiller 2y ago
    powertop is just relaying whatever value my laptop's battery is reporting for current+voltage, read from sysfs[0]. Are you suggesting my laptop's battery is merely estimating current and/or voltage? I don't know much about the hardware in my laptop's battery, and I'm not succeeding in finding information online, but I'm going to need a source to believe that considering how trivial it would be for the battery to report real values for current and voltage. Regardless, your point about AC/DC conversion losses is good considering the article almost certainly was measuring from AC seeing as how it doesn't have a battery. [0] https://github.com/fenrus75/powertop/blob/master/src/measurement/sysfs.cpp https://github.com/fenrus75/powertop/blob/master/src/measure...