Find out how much power the PC is using...

Emlyn_Dewar · 3 Dec 2010 at 20:57

I know a few people have devices that plug into the socket and then can plug devices in to see how much power they use.

Are they at all accurate? If so, can anyone recommend one?

I'm limited to 90w with the Antec mini skeleton. I'm under 90w at the moment due to some decent underclocking, however, I'm planning to throw my dual tuner TV card into the mix, along with a Blu-Ray drive...
I haven't a clue what this will do to overall power usage so would just like to see how leeway much I have to play with.

Thanks for any help.

Danny862 · 3 Dec 2010 at 21:11

extreme.outervision.com/psucalculatorlite.jsp
This lets you calculate you power supply usage. Dont think there is any problem with posting this link on the forum

Tealc · 3 Dec 2010 at 23:55

Emlyn_Dewar; said:
I know a few people have devices that plug into the socket and then can plug devices in to see how much power they use.

Are they at all accurate? If so, can anyone recommend one?.

Accurate enough I suppose. I bought the cheapest one I could find and it registers even a few watts draw and sees small changes. I know what stuff roughly uses and the meter confirms it.

No idea what a tv card uses though. A bd drive must use a few watts because it's mechanically spinning a disc and needs a fast revving motor.

setter · 3 Dec 2010 at 23:58

Im gonna buy one of theese myself, interested to see what my own rig is using, reviews etc can only tell you so much about power draw on the systems that they use, however everbodys rig will be different.

Ceryndrion · 4 Dec 2010 at 07:55

Most monitors will work well enough for what they do,

And when it comes to keeping power usage to a minimum, I run a standard dual core (e2160 iirc), along with the usual gubbins, and a gtx460, and in normal use, it barely draws 100w so I wouldn't worry too much..

Emlyn_Dewar · 4 Dec 2010 at 12:37

I'm running an X3 8550 which itself is a 95w part. It's down at 1.7ghz @ 1v though, so is running well below the 65w 8450e spec... Still aiming to go lower on voltage.

I'm just assuming the blu-ray drive will use a little more power than the DVD drive that's in just now.

Don't think there'll be a problem at all, but the idea is that this thing can run all day without concern. Since I am an extreme worrier, I'd rather just have a fairly accurate idea of the power it's pulling.

I must be getting old, underclocking and having a much cooler running chip is more interesting to me than getting a decent clock on the main PC...

Ceryndrion · 4 Dec 2010 at 13:14

I am guessing that your main concern is the wattage supplied by the psu? in which case, I would expect that you will find that the psu is more tollerant to things than other more sizeable units. Certainly was the case when I had a shuttle, that the little 240w supply that I had, was more than able to run my athlon64, a 9800gt and all the rest..

Just take it easy, and see what happens, worst that can happen is that yer psu can't supply the power

vertica · 4 Dec 2010 at 13:28

Remember there is the efficiency of the PSU to take into account too.

What a meter measures at the wall is not what your components are pulling from the PSU.
Most PSUs are nominally >80% efficient at all loads, so at best you can take one fifth of the value measured away to find out how much your PSU is being taxed.
However the PSU efficiency isn't fixed or linear - it varies a lot depending on how loaded the PSU is.