Leaving a server on all day

Charles Swiger cswiger at mac.com
Tue Jun 8 11:48:43 PDT 2004


On Jun 8, 2004, at 1:59 PM, Bill Moran wrote:
>> Hopefully I'll get my flat screen back soon from repair.  I guess 
>> those use
>> less power, right?
>
> I remember having this conversation with someone not too long ago, and 
> our
> consensus was that flat screens used just as much power as tube 
> monitors.  Don't
> hold me to that, though, I don't seem to remember our testing 
> technique as being
> very ... uhm ... "scientific".

No need to guess, use an amp-meter.  :-)

Radio Shack and the like will sell something with male and female plugs 
that will measure both voltage and current, and give you the current 
power load in Watts.  Smart UPSes may also have a similar capability.

>>  Also, a 1.8GHz Athlon won't use any more power than
>> necessary during idle time, right?
>
> Different processors are different.  Many newer CPUs will throttle 
> their power
> consumption while the machine is idle, but most older ones can't do 
> this.
> You'll need to research the specific CPU + motherboard to see if this 
> is
> available or not, but (as far as my lousy memory serves) Athlons in 
> the 1.8G
> range don't support reduced power during non-usage, and will consume 
> just as
> many watts while the system is idle as while it's doing a buildworld.

A 1.8GHz AMD is likely to be a Barton, or possibly a later-model 
Thoroughbred.  The CPU should have AMD's PowerNow! capabilities if APCI 
is enabled, and they should also significantly reduce power consumption 
if the OS runs the HLT instruction in the idle loop.

I have one machine with an AMD 1800+ (1.54 MHz T'bred-B), which runs at 
perhaps 48 or 50 C if the system is idle.  If I run something like 
SETI at Home for a day or so, the CPU will go up to around 56 or even 57 C 
as a result of the load.  The difference in thermal output due to load 
is very obvious.

-- 
-Chuck



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