4 ms·

I would like to add another comment on the matter of idle power draw, that is turning out to be somewhat disappointing on the platforms of this generation (a).

I would like to add another comment on the matter of idle power draw, that is turning out to be somewhat disappointing on the platforms of this generation (a). The TinyMiniMicro PCs from 8/9th-gen Intel are impressive as they can get below 3 W at the wall. Gemini Lake (Refresh) thin clients can also easily get under 4 W. I wonder whether these performances come from optimisations driven by actual market requirements (I guess it can make a difference for a company that run thousands of those?). ARM RK3588 platforms are champions in this regard. My Orange Pi 5 Plus idles at 1.5W (less than a RPi 4, with the same power supply). However, they are not viable for people who want to run Proxmox. It seems that almost all N100 platforms idle above 5 W. Also, there are not so many passively cooled options from reputable manufacturers, while actively cooled boxes are not so silent (while TinyMiniMicro PCs are super quiet under most usage scenarios). (a) With EU energy prices, a 5 W difference translates to 20-35 EUR per year on the electricity bill.

rcarmo 2y ago
Yeah, all my N-series machines idle at 6-8W with nothing but an EMMC/SSD and Ethernet plugged it. Older J-series are about the same. RK3588 boards go substantially lower, and the other RK series look to do less.
- kvemkon 2y ago
  What are W-ratings of the power supplies for N-series and RK?
Wytwwww 2y ago
> (a) With EU energy prices, a 5 W difference translates to 20-35 EUR per year on the electricity bill. 0.45 - 0.80 €/kWh is surely on the high-end? In most countries it seem to be less than ~0.25 (pr at least 0.3) https://qery.no/consumer-energy-prices-in-europe/ https://qery.no/consumer-energy-prices-in-europe/
- wkat4242 2y ago
  14c here in Spain yeah. Some countries like the Netherlands are a lot higher but they painted themselves in a corner with gas dependence. At the same time Russian imports became politically unviable their own gas fields became untenable due to earthquakes. Prices went up to 50-100c per kWh and I believe still hover around the 40c level there. Most of the electricity there isn't generated by gas but they also stimulated electric heat pump heating heavily leading to a huge pressure on the grid. But anyway I live in Spain now so I don't care :P
  - blacklion 2y ago
    I'm paying 6.9 cent per kWh (yes, 0.069€, I've counted zeroes right) in the Netherlands right now. It is sunny day with almost no wind. It will be more expensive at night (my provider adjusts prices each 30 minutes). But highest price in last 7 days was 17с/kWh around ~22:00 at Sunday :) Typical not-midday price is about 7-8 cents.
    - Wytwwww 2y ago
      But I assume with market pricing there are some pretty volatile swings depending on wind/sun especially outside of summer?
      - blacklion 2y ago
        Yep. But it is still cheaper around the year than "old-style" providers with fixed or per-month prices. I could pay 100 euro/month for electricity (for everything but hot water and warming) and gas (for hot water and warming of house, double-contour gas boiler) in summer and 250/month in winter, but typical "fixed-price" contract is 200-210/month for my house each month no matter what. And fixed part of these 100-250 Euro (like grid maintenance, which doesn't depend on consumption) is rather large, something about 75 Euro/month, so in summer I'm paying almost only for grid :)
      - wkat4242 2y ago
        I don't have market pricing here in Spain, I have fixed per kWh pricing only. I prefer this because I hate the min-maxing and figuring out cheap hours etc. I just want to use my energy when it suits my life, I don't want to rearrange my life around it. But the people that are totally into that love it because it allows them to save cost. I really don't care. See this: https://www.endesa.com/en/catalog/light/one/one-luz https://www.endesa.com/en/catalog/light/one/one-luz (the "Energy Term" is the kWh price - pre tax but the tax has just been dropped to 10%, so it's even less than 14 cents now!) I think you have to get market pricing if you have solar panels but most people don't bother especially because that market pricing makes them totally cost-ineffective. Also, I live in an apartment anyway where I can't even have them if I wanted to.
justsomehnguy 2y ago
> I wonder whether these performances come from optimisations driven by actual market requirements The lightning in the office buildings (using the thin clients in the first place) dwarfs the thin client usage by thousands. Sure, the totals are less, but...
sva_ 2y ago
Ryzen 7840HS laptop idles around 2.5W when the screen is off (WiFi running and connected, 32GB Ram, 1TB NVMe)
- machinekob 2y ago
  How do you calculated it i only saw idle around ~5-10W for 7000x laptop series in most tests.
  - sva_ 2y ago
    I use an external USB multimeter to get the actual powerdraw
    - machinekob 2y ago
      Did you undervolt it? Or you just got some blessed silicon. 7700 desktop was drawing 35W idle for me so I would love to get anything close to this magic.
      - sva_ 2y ago
        It's a mobile CPU 7040 series and you can't undervolt it. But you can limit TDP using a tool like ryzenadj. I set it to 20W on battery and the full 51W (or what it was) while connected to AC. Not sure about lottery because this is my only Ryzen PC, I think a 7840U might run a little lower though, if I'm not mistaken about the binning process. Take note this is a real idling wattage when it's not doing much at all. At the time when I tested this yesterday, I only had a terminal and browser open (Linux), and turned the screen off via dpms. https://postimg.cc/XGb3sV0F https://postimg.cc/XGb3sV0F (0.87Wh in 20m20s ~2.56W/h) With wifi off it approaches 2W
        machinekob 2y ago
        This is blessed silicon for sure mine ryzen always (3000 series 7000 series) have very high power consumption in idle right now I’m mostly on M1 ultra and are around 7-10W idle compared to 45W on 3900x and 35-40 on 7700. (I have also intel server with 12700k that idle around 15W but it is undervolted a bit)

rcarmo 2y ago

Yeah, all my N-series machines idle at 6-8W with nothing but an EMMC/SSD and Ethernet plugged it. Older J-series are about the same. RK3588 boards go substantially lower, and the other RK series look to do less.

kvemkon 2y ago
What are W-ratings of the power supplies for N-series and RK?

Wytwwww 2y ago

> (a) With EU energy prices, a 5 W difference translates to 20-35 EUR per year on the electricity bill. 0.45 - 0.80 €/kWh is surely on the high-end? In most countries it seem to be less than ~0.25 (pr at least 0.3) https://qery.no/consumer-energy-prices-in-europe/ https://qery.no/consumer-energy-prices-in-europe/

wkat4242 2y ago
14c here in Spain yeah. Some countries like the Netherlands are a lot higher but they painted themselves in a corner with gas dependence. At the same time Russian imports became politically unviable their own gas fields became untenable due to earthquakes. Prices went up to 50-100c per kWh and I believe still hover around the 40c level there. Most of the electricity there isn't generated by gas but they also stimulated electric heat pump heating heavily leading to a huge pressure on the grid. But anyway I live in Spain now so I don't care :P
- blacklion 2y ago
  I'm paying 6.9 cent per kWh (yes, 0.069€, I've counted zeroes right) in the Netherlands right now. It is sunny day with almost no wind. It will be more expensive at night (my provider adjusts prices each 30 minutes). But highest price in last 7 days was 17с/kWh around ~22:00 at Sunday :) Typical not-midday price is about 7-8 cents.
  - Wytwwww 2y ago
    But I assume with market pricing there are some pretty volatile swings depending on wind/sun especially outside of summer?
    - blacklion 2y ago
      Yep. But it is still cheaper around the year than "old-style" providers with fixed or per-month prices. I could pay 100 euro/month for electricity (for everything but hot water and warming) and gas (for hot water and warming of house, double-contour gas boiler) in summer and 250/month in winter, but typical "fixed-price" contract is 200-210/month for my house each month no matter what. And fixed part of these 100-250 Euro (like grid maintenance, which doesn't depend on consumption) is rather large, something about 75 Euro/month, so in summer I'm paying almost only for grid :)
    - wkat4242 2y ago
      I don't have market pricing here in Spain, I have fixed per kWh pricing only. I prefer this because I hate the min-maxing and figuring out cheap hours etc. I just want to use my energy when it suits my life, I don't want to rearrange my life around it. But the people that are totally into that love it because it allows them to save cost. I really don't care. See this: https://www.endesa.com/en/catalog/light/one/one-luz https://www.endesa.com/en/catalog/light/one/one-luz (the "Energy Term" is the kWh price - pre tax but the tax has just been dropped to 10%, so it's even less than 14 cents now!) I think you have to get market pricing if you have solar panels but most people don't bother especially because that market pricing makes them totally cost-ineffective. Also, I live in an apartment anyway where I can't even have them if I wanted to.

justsomehnguy 2y ago

> I wonder whether these performances come from optimisations driven by actual market requirements The lightning in the office buildings (using the thin clients in the first place) dwarfs the thin client usage by thousands. Sure, the totals are less, but...

sva_ 2y ago

Ryzen 7840HS laptop idles around 2.5W when the screen is off (WiFi running and connected, 32GB Ram, 1TB NVMe)

machinekob 2y ago
How do you calculated it i only saw idle around ~5-10W for 7000x laptop series in most tests.
- sva_ 2y ago
  I use an external USB multimeter to get the actual powerdraw
  - machinekob 2y ago
    Did you undervolt it? Or you just got some blessed silicon. 7700 desktop was drawing 35W idle for me so I would love to get anything close to this magic.
    - sva_ 2y ago
      It's a mobile CPU 7040 series and you can't undervolt it. But you can limit TDP using a tool like ryzenadj. I set it to 20W on battery and the full 51W (or what it was) while connected to AC. Not sure about lottery because this is my only Ryzen PC, I think a 7840U might run a little lower though, if I'm not mistaken about the binning process. Take note this is a real idling wattage when it's not doing much at all. At the time when I tested this yesterday, I only had a terminal and browser open (Linux), and turned the screen off via dpms. https://postimg.cc/XGb3sV0F https://postimg.cc/XGb3sV0F (0.87Wh in 20m20s ~2.56W/h) With wifi off it approaches 2W
      - machinekob 2y ago
        This is blessed silicon for sure mine ryzen always (3000 series 7000 series) have very high power consumption in idle right now I’m mostly on M1 ultra and are around 7-10W idle compared to 45W on 3900x and 35-40 on 7700. (I have also intel server with 12700k that idle around 15W but it is undervolted a bit)