Power usage: Athlon 3200+ vs. P3 1Ghz

[ZeroFrag]

So i got my electric bill, and it has gone up over the last few month. I'm not even talking about the dollar amount, i'm just talking about daily average kilowatt usage.

I been leavin my system on basically non-stop for about 6 month, usually i only reboot it to install a program or when there is a problem. I'm always either rendering something, downloading something or encoding.

I wonder if that usage could be enough to increase my electric bill by that much.

My current system specs:
Asus A8N-Deluxe MB
6800GT PCI-E (only one)
AMD Athlon 3500+
1024MB DDR Ram
Sound Card
3 Sata Drives
495W PSU
21" Professional Series ViewSonic monitor
2 + 1 Speaker setup


Is there a way to figure out how much power my system consumes. And how i would compare to a 1GHz P3 bare system with low-end graphics card. Would the difference be noticable. Since none of the rendering or downloading or encoding is mission critical and i don't care if it takes a couple hours or even days longer i'm trying to see if it would save me enough on electricity to clean up the old P3 and setup the system.

Is there a meter or something i can hook up to the powerstrip that measures consumption? Is there something else i can do to calculate power consumption.

Thanks
Thomas S.

 

[bob4432]

Kill-O-Watt

 

[ZeroFrag]

Hmm, looks like thats what i need to get.

Have you used it? Does it work like it is supposed to?

 

[ZeroFrag]

This might sound like a really stupid question, but will max current of 15 Amps be enough to test a whole power strip with all my computer equipment plugged in?

Operating Voltage: 115 VAC
Max Voltage: 125 VAC
Max Current: 15 A
Max Power: 1875 VA
Weight: 5 oz.
Dimensions: 5 1/8" x 1 5/8" x 2 3/8"

Not really sure how close a full system with monitor, computer and speakers gets to that. Just don't want to burn the new toy before i get to use it.

 

[bob4432]

no i haven't used one, but have read a lot about them.

not sure about the max portion of your question, but if you do, i wouldn't turn everything on at once. i know in my computer room i have quite a bit of stuff plugged and usually each socket has a 6 position power strip and they are on 20A breakers, but not one has ever tripped. if i shut everything down and then turned it all on at the same time there might be a problem. this is just a guess.

 

[nineball9]

The Kill-O-Watt is a great little gizmo. I've used it for measuring electricity usage for various items. I also use it with my variable isolation transformer when bringing a device up to working voltage while checking for a spike in current. My old BK variac has a front panel meter, switchable between volts and amps, but the switch sticks on the amp setting; I have to wiggle it to get a correct reading. I use my Kill-O-Watt to supplement the meter.

Your system will work fine on a standard US 15 amp circuit. Everything in the tower - regardless of what drives, graphics card, etc you own - runs off the power supply unit. Figure a 495 watt PSU at 70% efficiency equals about 700 watts. (It will be very rare to have your PSU running at max output.) Your monitor is an LCD - 70 watts according ViewSonic's online PDF spec sheet. If you have a 100 watt speaker system, it may be around 50% efficiency, which comes to 200 watts.

So the max power you will draw will be 700+70+200 watts + whatever else you have plugged in to the same outlet. Your system won't actually use this much unless you fully load your PSU or buy speakers powerful enough to blast your neighbors in the next zip code (and deafen you). The components will draw a surge current when powered up, but you'll be fine. A Kill-O-Watt (or similar device) will give you precise numbers.

I run a 465W PSU, 100W speakers, 22" NEC CRT (1.25 amps!), multifunction printer, phone, several lamps and other items (including my old P3 system sometimes) on the same circuit with no problems.

Good luck!

 

[ZeroFrag]

thanks for all the great help you guys provided.

nineball9, i actually have a 21" CRT, not LCD

but i solved the problem by just pluggin in one thing at a time and keeping an eye on the voltage and amps

 

[nineball9]

Sorry - my bad. I typed in the monitor name & model as you listed it and got the specs for the LCD monitors. You'll be fine - I use a 22" CRT with no problems - just don't try running heavy appliances on the same circuit!

Good luck!

 

[hemiram]

If you get a UPS it's software will tell you what's being drawn on it.

My home PC now pulls 135 watts, with a 17"LCD

With my old 19" Dell Trinitron CRT, it pulled over 230.

 

[ZeroFrag]

I just got the Kill A Watt and it looks ok. I plugged in my room fan, for 26 hours, and it started out at 0.19KWh and 110volts up to 1.4KWh and 115volts. Is that normal? I understand i might have to work a little bit harder during the middle of the day because of the heat and such, but this is 6 times more.

 

[imported_erikm5150]

http://users.erols.com/chare/elec.htm

 

[nineball9]

Originally posted by: ZeroFrag
I just got the Kill A Watt and it looks ok. I plugged in my room fan, for 26 hours, and it started out at 0.19KWh and 110volts up to 1.4KWh and 115volts. Is that normal? I understand i might have to work a little bit harder during the middle of the day because of the heat and such, but this is 6 times more.

Unless the Kill-O-Watt has been redesigned since I bought my unit, you are measuring cumulative energy consumption, not instantaneous. See items 6 and 7 in the Operation Manual.
Voltage variations are normal; try a scope to measure your AC voltage with more precision.

 

[imported_goku]

Originally posted by: bob4432
Kill-O-Watt

I love this device, it's so useful.

 

[teutonicknight]

You can try undervolting your processor if you want to save energy