Which is prefectly acceptable considering he is looking for a desktop replacement.
Energy efficient PC? Worth it?
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Which is prefectly acceptable considering he is looking for a desktop replacement.
Soldato
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thats suprising!. my laptop uses <30 at idle, and only 85 or so when charging the the battery and uder load. its a p8400 c2d, pm45 chipset, 4gb ram, ati hd3470 ect. thats using the laptops lcd at full brightness as well
What is it that's surprising you James?
All those values were calculated using a power usage wall plug with only the PC plugged in.
Is it just that the usage of a laptop is better than a desktop - not really that surprising considering it needs to be portable and not run the battery down in 30 minutes.
gt
Soldato
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well, because your itx with a lesser cpu uses more at idle and load than my laptop does while powering an lcd and charging its battery......and mine has also been measured at the wall. i would have thought they'd be pretty evenly matched tbh
tada, 45w playing a bluray for example.
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Yes... except for that meaty lipo battery inside of your ultra green laptop
If you do go for a laptop though I suggest the Samsung Q310. Or the R560 if ocuk are still doing it. Bought the q310 for my birthday and its flippin brilliant.
I understand - wasn't made too clear. Completely agree though.
Yours is a laptop and uses much more modern and 'specifically efficient' hardware - plus it is designed to use as little as possible to run for as long as possible on a 'relatively' small battery so should use less.
For power saving desktop hardware VIA/Atom/mobile C2D style chipsets are all you can get and generally return this kind of power usage from what i can see. It seems it's down to the manufacturers to reduce these usage levels.
If the OP needs ultimate power saving then it would probably be the best choice but if it were me then i personally would not go for a laptop as in my experience their lifespan is quite limited when compared to desktops.
gt
I'm not entirely sure what you're getting at here.
Undervolt your CPU and underclock it. Do the same to your CPU and RAM if possible.
The OP wanted to save money. My point was that by the time you've sold all your stuff and bought new, low power stuff you'll probably be down on cash. And any small saving in power bills probably won't counteract this. Plus there's the fact that you've spent considerable time researching, selling, buying and building a new system. I don't really see it as being worth it, unless you were going to buy a new system anyway.
Soldato
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yep, and damned expensive too 
i went for a laptop because it made more sense to me. i used my gaming pc less and less to the point where it wasnt getting used for anythign but browsing and photoshop, and using 200w + at idle. using the laptop i cut that buy 90% and load by about 80%. it also uses 1/4 of the power my ps3 did when playing bluray, the saving is totally offset by the inital outlay of the laptop, of course, but it makes me feel better. and of course, i can carry this thing around which i certainly could not do easily with the old pc lol
i went for a laptop because it made more sense to me. i used my gaming pc less and less to the point where it wasnt getting used for anythign but browsing and photoshop, and using 200w + at idle. using the laptop i cut that buy 90% and load by about 80%. it also uses 1/4 of the power my ps3 did when playing bluray, the saving is totally offset by the inital outlay of the laptop, of course, but it makes me feel better. and of course, i can carry this thing around which i certainly could not do easily with the old pc lol
Sounds like the perfect compromise then matey.
I should probably do the same since i browse a great deal on my full sized rig - there's no doubting that laptops are pretty awesome when it comes to efficient running!
Looks like a lovely piece of kit.
gt
Thanks again for the replies, think I might stick with what I've got for now, but have a play about with the power settings, as the expense of swapping things over will probably negate any savings made on the electric bill!
Laptop's probably the best idea, but I like to tinker, so that puts me off straight away, and the size does too, my current screen has 29% more viewable area than a 17", and 16% more than a 19", makes a huge difference at the end of the day, and I don't know if it's a sacrifice I'd be willing to make.
Laptop's probably the best idea, but I like to tinker, so that puts me off straight away, and the size does too, my current screen has 29% more viewable area than a 17", and 16% more than a 19", makes a huge difference at the end of the day, and I don't know if it's a sacrifice I'd be willing to make.
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whenever i need the extra space, i just plug the laptop in to my 24" DGM. most of the time however, i dont need 1920x1200 to view websites and whatnot lol - 1600x900 is plenty for me
whenever i need the extra space, i just plug the laptop in to my 24" DGM. most of the time however, i dont need 1920x1200 to view websites and whatnot lol - 1600x900 is plenty for me
It's not the resolution though, it's the viewable area that concerns me, my 22" is ideal, and the 15.4/17" laptops I've used just seem too small, and a 19" laptop would be too big and expensive.
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i suppose it all depends on how close you sit to the screen. true enough, i sit a lot closer to my laptop screen than my DGM. close enough that they probably fill about the same field of vision, but its just down to preference at the end of the day - there's no right or wrong lol
Get notebook, get eee pc .... lol why dont you get a smartphone instead hahahhahaa.
Really, just get a wolfdale based platform on matx mobo with built-in gpu, also you can cool the CPU passively and here you go, takes almost no power. You can underclock the CPU as well if you need the power.
Really, just get a wolfdale based platform on matx mobo with built-in gpu, also you can cool the CPU passively and here you go, takes almost no power. You can underclock the CPU as well if you need the power.
I've already got an E8400, any mobo you'd recommend? And would an m-atx board fit in my PC7?
I've got GA-73PVM-S2H , very nice matx board, has 7.1 sound, VGA, DVI, HDMI, eSATA and even a decent OCing features ( could use for undervolting in your case ). just over 50 quid on OCuk atm.
And as GT have mentioned - should fit fine, you can check exact dimensions if u're not sure
.
And as GT have mentioned - should fit fine, you can check exact dimensions if u're not sure
.I've got GA-73PVM-S2H , very nice matx board, has 7.1 sound, VGA, DVI, HDMI, eSATA and even a decent OCing features ( could use for undervolting in your case ). just over 50 quid on OCuk atm.
And as GT have mentioned - should fit fine, you can check exact dimensions if u're not sure
How's the 630i chipset power consumption wise? Looked at a few reviews, but can't find one that quotes any power figures? Cheers.