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Thread ID: 28843 2003-01-02 17:47:00 Wattage to Power Cost cyberchuck (173) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
110570 2003-01-03 00:52:00 Since it needs to be on all the time, reasons for turning it off go away. Look at the BIOS power control options. You might be able to turn off disks, slow the CPU, and do all sorts of things when it's not busy.

Obviously you're not planning on making megadollars in e-commerce, and have not got an international fibre cable terminating in your house to handle the traffic. (Yet).

Feel for people running server farms ... or Google with 10000 Pentium boxes as their spider cluster.

I've got a few of the filter capacitors taken out of the 4000 A 5V supply of one computer I used when it was "decommissioned". I think a Cray2 used about 30kW. Even the PDP8 used about a kW.
Graham L (2)
110571 2003-01-03 01:17:00 My computer is usually on 24/7 unless I'm doing some major tinkering inside the PC. Or I'm rebooting so I can adjust the FSB. Computer downstairs is usually 24/7 as well.

I am usually downloading something anyway so I want it on for that and I'm always crunching.

If I'm going away for a couple of days I'll either cue up the downloads and leave it going, or I'll switch it off.

I don't do 24/7 because I find it more reliable or not as hard on components or anything, I just find it nice having it ready and waiting. Quite good for having a warm room to wake up to as well.

I don't pay the powerbill........ yet, though. Maybe I'll change my habits when i do.
-=JM=- (16)
110572 2003-01-03 01:26:00 Well JM, From the looks of things above, it can work out at under a dollar a day, which is pretty good IMHO! If you're only paying extra, say its left on all day (12hours) and you pay the extra of leaving it on at night - another 12 hours, then that's only 50c a day at MAX you'll pay... Roughly that is. Work that out to about $15 a month!! Still, its a fair amount, but not too much.. $3.5 PW!

Cheers


Chilling_Silence

BTW, I switch mine off at night, but its a pretty finely tuned AMD Athlon XP 1700+ so it boots quite quickly :-)
Chilling_Silence (9)
110573 2003-01-03 03:17:00 Yeah . . .

From memory, (and it's not that hard considering I wrote it down to remind myself), the Tower of Terror at Dreamworld Australia uses 2 . 2MegaWatts each time it goes up (to get the necessary speed required or something like that ?:|) . . In theory as it goes once every 30 seconds, and DreamWorlds open from 10:00am to 5:00pm, so that's 7 hours a day, thats

2 rides per minute x 60 minutes in an hour x 7 hours of rides

Although Dreamworld would probably get charged by the gigawatt, so that blows any remaining theorys . . . .

Well that's just some useless info for ya



CyberChuck
cyberchuck (173)
110574 2003-01-03 03:39:00 2.2 Megawatts is only 3,000 Horsepower. There is a 3,000 HP motor in a nearby factory, its not that uncommon to get motors of this size. godfather (25)
110575 2003-01-03 03:39:00 Of course, if you want big power bills, build a big particle accelerator. I think one of the CERN ones used 30 MW. There are bigger ones. (Though it's all relative. 30 MW is a bit under 40 000 HP, and I suppose our Navy frigates use about that at maximum speed. ;-) ). Graham L (2)
110576 2003-01-03 03:57:00 lol, we still have navy frigates

- David
ps. haha i remember when the navy was selling a stripped down frigate or navy boat in the trade and exchange
DangerousDave (697)
110577 2003-01-03 04:02:00 cyberchuck: Did you work all that out while standing in the queue or after you got home?? :O How many rides did you manage to fit in? Man, that place is fun! :p :D Susan B (19)
110578 2003-01-03 04:26:00 The tower of terror is powered by electromagnets. I forget all the guff about it, But there is a whole heap of stuff written down by it about how it uses enough power to run a small town. -=JM=- (16)
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