Re: Where to go to learn about reducing electricity use?
On Mon, Jan 01, 2007 at 07:30:40PM -0600, Reid Priedhorsky wrote:
> On Tue, 02 Jan 2007 01:40:11 +0100, Douglas Tutty wrote:
> >
> > On Mon, Jan 01, 2007 at 05:06:02PM -0600, Reid Priedhorsky wrote:
> >>
> >> I would like to make my Etch box use less power, but I'm having a hard
> >> time consolidating all the information I'm finding. Is there a package I
> >> can install or a web page I can read that is a gentle guide to reducing my
> >> power usage?
> >>
> >
> > A good place to start may be something like the laptop-howto.
> >
> > What power are you trying to reduce? Beware spinning down drives to
> > reduce power; spinning up reduces drive life.
>
> Thanks for your reply. It is a self-built Athlon desktop, though I assume
> much of the advice in the laptop-howto will be relevant. I will take a
> look. I'm happy to provide more specs on the box if that will be helpful.
>
> I'm not really sure how to answer your question. I know that spinning down
> drives is not such a good idea, and that I can reduce processor speed when
> idle (though how I don't know), but beyond that I don't have a good idea
> of what options are available to me.
>
Hi Reid,
I'm running Etch amd64 on my box (Athlon 3800+, Asus M2N-SLI Deluxe MB,
1 GB stick of DDR2 800, dual Seagate Barracuda 80 GB drives, DVD burner,
Asus nVidia 7300 GT silent GPU, in a CoolerMaster Stacker case with
cross-flow fan, blow-hole fan, three drive modules with 120 mm fans, CM
iGreen 600W PSU).
I have the MB handle the fan speeds (adjusts for temperature, not for
quiet) and most of the time can't hear anything but a slight directional
high-pitch from the CPU fan.
I just put an ampmeter on it during boot and it uses 1.2 A at 120 V so
that's 100W.
I note that theres a package to throttle the CPU based on load. I don't
know if this reduces the power consumption for what you're looking for.
It may primarily just reduce the CPU temperature (although mine hovers
at around 40 C).
Why are you worried about power consumption on a desktop?
Doug.
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