PSU's and how much power they use...

[SidewinderINC]

Hi all,

ive got a few questions about PSU's and computer power in general...

my housemates sometimes bitch about me leaving my computer turned on "idling" - well downloading, with all things plugged into it (monitor, soundcard, stereo etc. etc.) turned OFF when i go into uni because it wastes power.

now i'm not denying the fact that it does waste power, but how much power?

i have a tagan 480W PSU, and i think it takes just over 500W as its 80% efficient (no idea on the specifics, i read that in a Custom PC a while back).

when its idling doing nothing is it still drawing that full amount of power from the socket into the PSU and then wasting the rest away?
or does it take what it needs?

if it takes what it needs is there any way of knowing rougly how much its taking?

if there is an article or something explaining all of this a link would be great, and if unlinkable, email in trust

cheers guys

S.INC

 

[Xplo]

Well whats your pc specs? I doubt at full load the tagan is using up all 480w, so lets pretend at full load it uses 400w's. at idle it will use most likely half that, so say 250w to be safe.

I dont know about your area but it seems to cost 8p per hour per 1000w, so at idle it will cost you 2p an hour for just your base unit to run, obv an approx figure.

 

[SidewinderINC]

my sys is :

32 bit..

XPm2400(35w) @ 2300Mhz (1.7v)
6800GT (Stock)
1GB 3500 HyperX

thats about it for the core components

 

[ste_bla]

Have a look at http://extreme.outervision.com/index.jsp

With a couple of HDD looks like 300w

Therefore when idling 100w maybe?

8p per kwh

So when idling around a pennie and hour, but remeber if you have a crt that uses a hell of a lot of power

 

[SidewinderINC]

nup, got a belinea 20.1"WS TFT

so around 2pph at most when idle. thats not too bad then.

EDIT -

just done the PSU test jobby, 256W is what it came out at. only have 1 92mm fan and 1 HDD in my system...