PC Power Costs

[mysterious_w]

How much would it generally cost to a keep a PC running idle with the monitor switched off? This is so I can comabt my Dad's cries of "Turn that bloody thing off, you're not the one paying the electricity bills".

Probably a few hundreds of dollars per year. (not so many hundreds, 2 maybe 3 I guess)

[mysterious_w]

I am looking for per hour type estimates

[Print]

It can't be that much.

But just set it so it goes into standby every 45 minutes or something.. than you can say the alarm clock is using just as much power

Or just tell him it's in standby mode anyway. Depending on how computer literate your dad is, he might not know the difference.

[General Geoff]

a computer without a monitor, at idle, is probably using 50 watts or less.

[gaekwad2]

Depends on your psu, cheap ones are often extremely inefficient under low load.

[Warrior of the Light]

Say it produces 50Watts while it's in standby mode like Geoff said.

50W (in an hour)

365*24=8760 hours (in a year)

50*8760= 438000Wh = 438KWh

€0.0619 per KWh (according to NUON (Dutch electics company))

438*0.0619 = 27.1122 (€27.11 or £18.40) per year.

------------------------------------

With complete load (let's say you have a 250W PSU)
that would be 250*8760/1000*0.0619 = €135,561 = £92

/edit for 20W that would be £7.36

[General Geoff]

In standby it'll go down to about 20 watts actually. I just meant idling with a blank screensaver.

[mysterious_w]

£20 a year then. Right that'll do nicely.

Top work lads.

Oh... Guess I'll leave it on tonight then

[Cognition]

Originally posted by WarriorO/TLight
€0.0619 per KWh (according to NUON (Dutch electics company))

Damn you people with your cheap electricity, I worked out mine is €0.089/kWh. Plus a €0.19 daily fixed charge (maybe you have a fixed charge too).

There was a newspaper article here recently with a woman talking about moving from Canada to NZ. In Canada of course winters are colder (we get down to about 0ºC minimum) but they have cheap power, and keep their homes heated constantly as well as having very good insulation.

Here we're only just starting to do double glazing etc and it's too expensive to constantly heat houses electrically, so we just wear lots of clothes and get used to it.

[Myxomatosis]

Even when it's shut down a computer still draws a bit of energy. Maybe you save some money not having to wait for boot all the time?

[gaekwad2]

Originally posted by Cognition
Here we're only just starting to do double glazing etc and it's too expensive to constantly heat houses electrically, so we just wear lots of clothes and get used to it.

Electric heating is very expensive (and wasteful).
Gas and oil are much more economic.

[bgesley]

or radiant heating is probably best. Might cost a pretty penny to impliment but you'll be saving a lot more money I think. Radiant heating uses these tubes the are built into the concret when they are laying down a ground floor. The tubes heat the concrete and warm the floor and thus the room. Had it in my old apartment and loved it.

[rtcpenguin]

Good topic. Does anyone know of a good energy cost calculator?

I used one the other week and it told me that my 96w compact fluroescent fixture used about $1.20 of electricity per month on 8 hours a day @ $.06/kWh

I would imagine a computer would use about double that. My PSU is a 420watt unit, but since most PSUs are switching these days, I'd imagine it draws somewhere along the line of 70-140 watts at idle. CRTs (19") draw about 95watts IIRC, so total we're talking around 200 watts. If you use you computer 8 hours a day, that would be double the cost of the compact fluorescent fixture, or ~$2.40

[PulseDriver]

Well, if you have MS Excel you have an exelent calculator for calculating power costs.. which can bring you all the formulas you'll ever need... in one sheet!

PS: Might take some time to make this sheet though, but you can use it for the next 3 months... I guess before MS releases a new Office

[MStar]

$0.0605/kWH here. [Canada]
(0.0374 EUR)
(0.0255 GBP)

[Warrior of the Light]

Overall: yay for nuclear energy!

There's no exhausts but H2O.

okay, there's the radioactive waste, but that can be contained or shot into space.

[. - .... .- -. ....]

Solution: buy a power meter like the one below.



And offer to pay for the power used. I don't blame your dad - why should he foot the bill because you're too lazy to turn off your computer...

[bkraptor]

Nobody should be forced to shut down their PC

[gaekwad2]

Originally posted by WarriorO/TLight
Overall: yay for nuclear energy!

There's no exhausts but H2O.

okay, there's the radioactive waste, but that can be contained or shot into space.

Mhm, shot into space.

[Wolfgang]

^ Yes, that sounds pretty safe.

Less than €0.1 per kWh??? WTF? We have no fixed charges, but each kWh costs about £0.11 in London, which is about €0.16. Damn. Since october we've paid about £500 in gas, electiricty and water bills. It blows.