Idle Game Consoles Raise Your Electricity Bill,

[pokerfan]

"Our tests found that leaving a Playstation 3 on while not in use would cost almost... five times more than it would take to run a refrigerator for the same yearly period," said the study which was published on Choice's web site.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080603/wr_nm/power_electronics_study_dc

[taterguy]

1. Damnit, game consoles are one of my favorite indulgences

Thanks for the tip, even if it means I have to get off the couch and turn the damn thing off.

[mtf80123]

2. Thanks for the heads-up

Just shut mine off.

Looks like I better figure out how to completely shut off the Plasma too.

[hokies4ever]

3. You have a plasma TV and you're worried about your electric bill?

Do you also have an SUV and you're worried about gas prices? :rofl:

[mtf80123]

10. No SUV...

My car gets 22 city and 28 hwy.

EVERY single light bulb in my house is CFL. All of my appliances are Energy Star rated (stove, washer, dryer, fridge and dish washer). I recycle all paper, glass and plastics, including boxes, plastic liners and packaging. Just about the only thing that goes in to my garbage is coffee grounds. 100% of my energy credits are for Wind Power and I eat only organic and localy produced foods (as much as I can) and I am vegetarian. As soon as Plug-in electrics are available I will be buying one as well.

Even if I have every light in my home on at the same time, I have calculated that I only use 550 watts maximum. My average lighting use is only 175 watts.

Am I green enough?

I have done my part and have no guilt... for now.

As soon as Plug-in electrics are available I will be buying one of those as well.

Since you decided to call me out...

what have you done for the cause?

[DireStrike]

12. CFLs?! Get with the program! Everyone is using LED lights now!

...well we should be lol. Nobody wants to change AGAIN though.

[mtf80123]

13. Sad but true

I have been pricing LED's, and right now it appears as though a 60 watt equivalent costs anywhere from $80 to $100 each.

If anyone knows where they can be purchased cheaper, I for one would certainly like to know.

[DireStrike]

19. Are they that expensive?!

Wow. I think the facilities don't exist to mass produce them, and that's why they're so expensive.

I know there was a DUer involved in the development and/or marketing, selling, distribution, something of LED bulbs. An idea before it's time, I'm afraid. The best shot there will be should be when the peak of the CFLs selling now start to burn out in some years.

[hokies4ever]

15. Does turning down the brightness on my laptop count?

:rofl:

I was just messing with you, don't get too upset. :patriot:

[mtf80123]

17. It's all good then...

I take my conservation efforts and investments very seriously.

[DireStrike]

4. Ugh why do they keep building these damn things as energy vampires

Have you noticed that it's getting harder and harder to find an OFF switch on any appliance? I always want a hard control switch, in a CONVENIENT LOCATION. If it's not convenient, I may as well just pull the plug.

But the damn systems don't need to idle. There's NO NEED for it. What a waste.

[pokerfan]

5. It's very annoying

I suppose that one excuse is that everything has a clock these days, which is just another annoyance come DST time twice a year. Plus anything that can turn on via a remote control must never be completely off by definition. Even appliance that don't have remotes have soft switches meaning that they're never really off either.

Another reason is that there are a lot of bad engineers out there who have always treated the mains as a free source of energy.

I guess the only solution is to plug everything into switched outlets or switched power strips.

[DireStrike]

7. I was thinking of finding switched power strips.

It seems like almost as much of a hassle as unplugging.

Oh, about clocks - when I was forbidden to use my computer during a dark period in my high school days, it was disassembled and stuffed in the basement. Every once in a great while I'd sneak down there in the middle of the night and reassemble to thing to get my fix of MUD gaming and/or pornography. The important thing is that the clock was always right, though it had been unplugged for weeks on end. I'm assuming it's the CMOS that has something to do with this; it shouldn't be hard to stick one of those into game systems, and I'd be surprised in fact if they don't already have it. Furthermore, the new systems go online, and probably update their clocks whenever they do.

The remote control issue is almost, ALMOST, a legitimate issue. I can grumble about laziness all I want, but comfort sells.

STILL. There is no reason for idle power consumption to be increasing. A ps3 should use no more power while idle than a VCR from 1980. Anything being done during that period is a complete waste, except perhaps maintaining the cooling fans for a minute or so after the system stops.

[hokies4ever]

16. Startup/shutdown decreases the life of many electrical items

Especially things like computers. That's probably why they put idle features on them. Tired of people sending stuff in to get replaced because its on warranty.

[populistdriven]

6. Not the Wii - Nintendo is a Green Company

while gaming


idle
http://www.hardcoreware.net/image.php?src=5478&ts=1172044688

[DireStrike]

8. Not a surprise.

Thanks, nintendo.

Does anyone ever ask sony or MS about this bullshit? What do they have to say for themselves?

Edit: That's unbelievable. Those systems are using 80-90% of the power they use normally, when idle! What the hell are they doing? Are you sure this is IDLE idle? The issue here is systems that are turned off, not ones that are just sitting and not running games, but are still in some sort of on mode.

OK - my mistake. Looking at the table in the original article, this indicates that the terrible power consumption is when the system is On as much as possible but not running a game. I don't know people who leave their systems in such a state when it's not necessary.

[Juche]

9. Don't shut it off, download folding@home

http://folding.stanford.edu/

You can use the unneeded CPU power to help Stanford to biotechnology research. If you leave it on you should download that program.

[DireStrike]

11. You mean IF you don't shut it off for some reason... THEN you should

get F@H. I'd find it hard to justify the cost and energy use to turn on a console just to run F@H.

On the other hand, if you like donating the cost of all that electricity to F@H, that's fine. You'd be basically paying to run a tiny portion of an F@H supercomputer.

[Rosemary2205]

14. Try buying a TOASTER.

My toaster croaked. 3 trift stores and 2 dollar stores turned up nothing. Gas is too expensive to be spending $9 in gas to buy a $2 toaster. So - I grit my teeth and went to Wallyworld. I finally broke down and bought a $12 toaster. I kid you not. I have to make a point of unplugging it when not in use because it CAN'T be turned off. It has a damn computer chip in it that does I have no idea what and sucks energy all the time.

Idiotic.

[momster]

18. Really want to know about your toaster?

Watch this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZslRQvv5zM

[populistdriven]

21. ahaaha red dwarf is great!!! n/t

[momster]

23. Grilled Bread Products Rule!

Your toaster is talking to the refrigerator about persuading the alarm clock to join the revolt! Be afraid and don't go to sleep!

[mtf80123]

20. New Calculation... lighting only

If every bulb in my home were standard Incandescent, I would have been using (2 bdrm condo):

All on at the same time 1,770 watts.
Lights on I would normally use 550 watts

Because every bulb in my home is now CFL (for the last 4 years):

All on at the same time 236 watts
Lights on I normally use 139 watts (if busy around the house)
Restfully...? (2 table lamps on) about 14 watts for two 60 equivalents

In "lighting only", I have reduced my consumption to less than 15% of what I was using less than 4 years ago.

The beauty of it is... My "lighting" use has not changed nor diminished. However, I have more money in my pocket and have suffered 0% reduction in my quality of life.

"edited for table light use."

[AlCzervik]

22. i have the tv, blue ray and wii on one power strip that i will now be shutting off when

not in use. thanks for the article.