I was also confused about graphics cards power consumption/ heat myself too, so I went searching and found this:
fairly comprehensive list of graphics cards power ratings , from here in Australia.

Hope that Helps

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"Living by the wisdom of computer science doesn't sound so bad after all. And unlike most advice, it's backed up by proofs." -- Algorithms to live by: The computer science of human decisions.

I've managed to get a 4th machine up & running. My company laptop was sat on the desk looking pretty & underused, so I have given it something to think about. 3 machines now running on the power monitor. Total load 180W

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13p/kw - OUTCH! We pay AU$0.16 per KW (inc GST) way under 1/2 your power cost. My main PC runs in at 215w normally, but with the HDD's powered down when I am not using it it comes in a little under 125 watts. The media PC, almost the same specs wont go below 165w but I think it is the spun down draw of one of the drives - it appears to use more power in standby than running?!?!?!

Both pc's run 24/7, but only the media PC is overclocked (Moderate 6% as its standard cooling is not up to the task yet - have to organise a better cooler soon)

Hi guy's ,in Europe, the Netherlands DON'T come cheap, with their electricity!
. It's about €00,23 KWh == nearly $00.30 KWh.

Four PC's in use, including a LapTop , all together the use 800Watt per hour =
24 x0.8KW= 19,2 KWh = €4,44 a day !
Doesn't come cheap !!!
//Fredericx51\\\\

Autch :) A suffering Friend :)

Well, maybe we should try to dig up PCI-Express graphics cards that uses as little power as possible.

Vendors never state the power consumption of their Graphics Cards, and they certainly do not make low powered cards. I have tried to get a low power graphics card, but I have to judge from the size of the heatfan.

I have found that PCI Cards can be too old to use in a new PCI-Express Mainboard, so I will have to stick to a PCI-Express card to make sure it stays stable.

Have You come across a low power graphics PCI-Express Card?

ChrisD

The graphics card I'm running is this one. According to the site Jason Gee linked to, at idle it is drawing 9 watts. At max 2d power it goes up to....10 watts lol, and at max 3d power (which mine never runs at) it goes up to 16 watts. Hope that helps.

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Daniel

Well, maybe we should try to dig up PCI-Express graphics cards that uses as little power as possible.

Vendors never state the power consumption of their Graphics Cards, and they certainly do not make low powered cards. I have tried to get a low power graphics card, but I have to judge from the size of the heatfan.

I have found that PCI Cards can be too old to use in a new PCI-Express Mainboard, so I will have to stick to a PCI-Express card to make sure it stays stable.

Have You come across a low power graphics PCI-Express Card?

ChrisD

I run a SAPPHIRE 100192L Radeon X1050 card. It was listed on the NewEgg site as not having a fan at all, but the actual version shipped to me had a very small fan. I expect this means it is much lower power than most current PCI-Express cards. Its performance seems entirely adequate for me, but I don't play games at all.

Surveying the low-price end of the PCI Express offerings at Newegg today, I spot:
MSI RX1550-TD128EH Radeon X1550

as having no fan at all (not in the picture, and confirmed by recent reviewers) and being quite low-priced. This seems likely to be pretty low power. The only two outputs are TV-out and DVI-I, however.

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Well, the other 2 PCs that I was expecting arrived and are already crunching!

I now have 1 * Intel dual core 2.8G, 2 * Dell 2.8G (Single processor), 1 Dell Laptop 1.5G & 1 Dell Laptop 1.6G all running on the power monitor and the total consumption is 350 Watts.

Don't forget the rating on the PSU isn't how much power it WILL draw, it is the maximum power loading that it will take. The systems I am running are minimal build with no monitors and only one hard drive (I use static IPs on my LAN and VNC into the machines).

I've got room for another few machines if they come along at the right price (or free!) although I am nearing what I decided would be a reasonable amount to spend on power.

At the current load the power costs will be a little over £1.10 a day or £33 a month (approx $65 a month).

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I was also confused about graphics cards power consumption/ heat myself too, so I went searching and found this:
fairly comprehensive list of graphics cards power ratings , from here in Australia.

Hope that Helps

Thanks wery much! That was a very useful link. :) Seems that the least power hungry cards can get by with as little as 7-10 Watts. That is 15 Watts less than the one I use now or a saving of $45 per Year.. (That is almost the same as the cost of the card.)

I think I'll go and get one, it still seems to be handling graphics decently.

ChrisD

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I was also confused about graphics cards power consumption/ heat myself too, so I went searching and found this:
fairly comprehensive list of graphics cards power ratings , from here in Australia.

Hope that Helps

I have whole systems that draw less than most of these cards.

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I was also confused about graphics cards power consumption/ heat myself too, so I went searching and found this:
fairly comprehensive list of graphics cards power ratings, from here in Australia.

Hope that Helps

Nice linkage Jason, My 7800GTX uses more wattage than a modern HD3850 It seems, So I may be getting a 3850 asapfm.

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Savoir-Faire is everywhere!
The T1 Trust, T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, America's First HST

I was also confused about graphics cards power consumption/ heat myself too, so I went searching and found this:
fairly comprehensive list of graphics cards power ratings , from here in Australia.

Hope that Helps

Great link!!!

National retailer F**'s is giving away the EVGA e-GeForce 6200 LE (after $50 Mail-in-Rebate) through 14 Feb (hope that wasn't a commercial advertisement ;-)

18W max!!! Just the card I need for my next OC'd Q6600!!! I'm just angry that I need a video card at all when I don't even have a monitor attached!

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$140 to 155 a month
about double that in the summer with everything on...
that will not happen again.

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I was also confused about graphics cards power consumption/ heat myself too, so I went searching and found this:
fairly comprehensive list of graphics cards power ratings , from here in Australia.

Hope that Helps

I have whole systems that draw less than most of these cards.

But they will not do much SETI crunching ;)

ChrisD

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$140 to 155 a month
about double that in the summer with everything on...
that will not happen again.

Ouch!

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Well, the other 2 PCs that I was expecting arrived and are already crunching!

I now have 1 * Intel dual core 2.8G, 2 * Dell 2.8G (Single processor), 1 Dell Laptop 1.5G & 1 Dell Laptop 1.6G all running on the power monitor and the total consumption is 350 Watts.

Don't forget the rating on the PSU isn't how much power it WILL draw, it is the maximum power loading that it will take. The systems I am running are minimal build with no monitors and only one hard drive (I use static IPs on my LAN and VNC into the machines).

I've got room for another few machines if they come along at the right price (or free!) although I am nearing what I decided would be a reasonable amount to spend on power.

At the current load the power costs will be a little over £1.10 a day or £33 a month (approx $65 a month).

I am still a little puzzled that Your Power Drain is so small.

I just checked an old Pentium II 450 MHz, FX chipset Mainboard, 256 Mb SD RAM and one 13 Gb HDD, S3 graphics card with a whopping 4 Mb of video RAM.

This lot draws 90 watts in idle, just showing windows desktop.

Most core 2 duo processors are rated at 89 Watts, I havent checked on Your P4's, but they are older and I guess that they are rated almost as high.

This gives almost 270 Watts without any power for convertion loss in the main boards' core voltage converters, much less the power needed by Your chipsets and the 10% needed in Your Power supplies. (A 90% convertion rate is pretty high.)
HDD's is approx 15 Watts each unless You use 2½" laptop drives.

I start to lack power for Your Laptops and the rest of Your gear, so that is why I wonder if Your Power Meter is OK..

I checked my Compaq Armada M700. That one can go as low as 10 Watts when display is off and machine is idle, but if I start this 850 MHz P3 crunching SETI, I won't get by with less than 60 Watts...

Seems that everybody elses' computers uses much less power than mine :(

My Power Meter is a Professional Model borrowed from a friend that works for the local utility and its reading corresponds with my Electricity Meter which is a brand new electronic model where the actual consumption in Watts can be read at a push of a button. This meter was installed in October of 2007.

Wife complaints when I experiment :) All power off but the one phase with the computers.

"Fridge, refrigerator, coffemaker, TV, Nothing works" is her complaint :) How did they get by before electricity :)

ChrisD

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I don't know why the differences. I also have 2 power meters. One that monitors the whole house and one that is plugged in with just the SETI machines on. The 2 meters concur with each other. i.e. the load on the whole house decreases by the same reading as the SETI monitor records when I turn them all off.

When you talk about the power draw, are you also referring to the draw at 240V mains?

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I don't know why the differences. I also have 2 power meters. One that monitors the whole house and one that is plugged in with just the SETI machines on. The 2 meters concur with each other. i.e. the load on the whole house decreases by the same reading as the SETI monitor records when I turn them all off.

When you talk about the power draw, are you also referring to the draw at 240V mains?

I was going to mention that. Most of the rest of the world used 220-240 volt 'lectricity. Here in the US we are stuck with inefficient 120v and double the amps....

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Clk2HlpSetiCty:::PayIt4ward

I don't know why the differences. I also have 2 power meters. One that monitors the whole house and one that is plugged in with just the SETI machines on. The 2 meters concur with each other. i.e. the load on the whole house decreases by the same reading as the SETI monitor records when I turn them all off.

When you talk about the power draw, are you also referring to the draw at 240V mains?

Yes that is correct :)

If You can spare the time, could You check Your Core 2 Duo when it is crunching? Just to see.?

No fingers to point ar Your way of checking Your load :)

This just leaves me with this thought, "Why the h... does my machines use so much juice"? Well, back to the drawing board :)

All the best

ChrisD

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This just leaves me with this thought, "Why the h... does my machines use so much juice"? Well, back to the drawing board :)

Hey Chris, Going back to the link that Jason provided..fairly comprehensive list of graphics cards power ratings

There's a link on that page for "eXtreme PSU Calculator". A tool where you put all the specifics of your configuration and it tells you your total draw. That might help a bit in determining what's sucking up all the "juice".

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I saw mention of professional power meters, careful what you're measuring.
Oversimplifying:
Check if you are measuring True power (which is what you pay for) or Apparent (Total) Power (which you don't pay for the reactive component as it's not economically feasible for the power company to install these kind of meters in every household). Apparent (Total) power includes the reactive power as a geometic sum ---> Apparent_Power = SQRT( TruePower^2 + ReactivePower^2) ).

And also Power factor is the ratio of True(paid for)Power, to Apparent(Total)Power.

Example: drawing 250 watts True power at (pretty good) power factor of 0.708 would be 353 watts apparent power.

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"Living by the wisdom of computer science doesn't sound so bad after all. And unlike most advice, it's backed up by proofs." -- Algorithms to live by: The computer science of human decisions.

I saw mention of professional power meters, careful what you're measuring.
Oversimplifying:
Check if you are measuring True power (which is what you pay for) or Apparent (Total) Power (which you don't pay for the reactive component as it's not economically feasible for the power company to install these kind of meters in every household). Apparent (Total) power includes the reactive power as a geometic sum ---> Apparent_Power = SQRT( TruePower^2 + ReactivePower^2) ).

And also Power factor is the ratio of True(paid for)Power, to Apparent(Total)Power.

Example: drawing 250 watts True power at (pretty good) power factor of 0.708 would be 353 watts apparent power.

Ah, so this maybe explains the difference? My (cheap) meters are showing the amount of power I am being charged for, where the expensive meter that ChrisD is using is showing the "Apparent power" which is a higher figure?

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[quote]

If You can spare the time, could You check Your Core 2 Duo when it is crunching? Just to see.?

177 Watts (according to the plug in meter). That's once it is booted up, settled down and crunching SETI on both processors.

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