How much power do you consume?

ShadowFox

During my quest to find alternative power sources Ive been looking at the amount of power my household consumes and trying to cut back on it.
So far we have cut it back from 5 tvs in the house to 2 (one in the sitting room and one in a new games room for the kids) and both of these are rated A+. We got rid of the microwave (hated using it anyway) and the electric kettle. Changed the cooker from electric to gas and now we are in the winter months we will be cooking and heating the house from a wood burning range. All bulbs in the house have been changed to led one which are said to last 25 years. Shed has been fitted with solar shed lights (mains there also if needed). Security lights are mains and solar powered 2 of each but all 4 are led. There are 6 laptops in the house but with smart phones most of these arent used so hoping next year to just get one home pc for everyone to use. With the changes we have made so far the electric bill has dropped by €30 every month hopefully that will drop even more during the winter as there will be no need for a clothes dryer, water heater, or electric oven.

Any other ideas on how to cut back or has anyone else tried doing something like this?

The Glass Key

TOO MUCH

There are at least 4 computers running as I speak :rolleyes:

GY A1

good job on making a saving,
its a full time job turning stuff off with kids,
visited a house recently and saw a sand timer in shower,
electric shower is a big drain
electric kettle is boiled here way too often

Cork boy 55

Need to replace ancient Desktop PC thinking of getting a laptop for less power consumption, even thou don't require mobility

How much Power does a Traditional desktop PC drain compared to a an average Laptop??

The Glass Key

Cork boy 55 wrote: »

Need to replace ancient Desktop PC thinking of getting a laptop for less power consumption, even thou don't require mobility

How much Power does a Traditional desktop PC drain compared to a an average Laptop??

Simplest way of looking at it is that a laptop can't use more than the rating on the power supply. So a laptop with a 90W AC adapter can't use more than 90W and most of the time it will be using a lot less than that

My experience of actually calculating the power consumption on a basic PC with a 14 inch LCD screen was 150W. If you added in a bigger screen a powerful graphics card and another HDD then that would go up to 250W.

So I'd say laptop would use less than half the power of the most basic desktop.

One of the simplest power saving devices I have is a set of remote control power switches. All the ancillary gear (printers, switches, routers, speakers external HDD etc) go into one power block and thats plugged into one remote control switch and another power block has more essential items like main PC and screen plugged into it and its also plugged into a remote controlled switch. I can switch off all the gear I have without grovelling around on the floor from one Lidls remote controller costing 20euro, that way it actually all gets turned off at the mains every night.

Found this interesting article on desktop consumption http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/truth-pc-power-consumption,1707.html bit out of date but shows "watt" is really going on.

ShadowFox

GY A1 wrote: »

good job on making a saving,
its a full time job turning stuff off with kids,
visited a house recently and saw a sand timer in shower,
electric shower is a big drain
electric kettle is boiled here way too often

We got a new heating system in when we did a major renovation at the beginning of the year and have to say its great 3 hours on for the water and no problem with getting 6 showers so no need for an electric shower also changed from rads to underfloor heating and its unreal, that and a major insulating job all round at a guess id say 1 hour per day on the cold days so far. Cant wait to check it out if we get the snow and ice again (see if we really got our moneys worth)

The kids leaving everything turned on was the main reason behind the games room. Picked up those remote plugs as said by Glass Key 4 of them in the room remote stuck beside the light switch just press the all off button and the room is shut down (Also good when my eldest and his mates were watching a horror film )

Tabnabs

solar shed lights

Any details on this? I am currently looking into it but had been told don't bother.

ShadowFox

Tabnabs wrote: »

Any details on this? I am currently looking into it but had been told don't bother.

These are the type im using http://www.ebay.ie/itm/Solar-LED-Shed-Portable-Camping-Light-/150524605131?pt=UK_Garden_Lighting&hash=item230bf732cb
they are fine for finding your way around the shed to look for something in general but i wouldnt recommend doing any work with them I switch to mains power for that

ghogie91

I tried calculating this about a month ago

I wouldnt have a million things running but I couldnt account for the power I am using when showering or cooking

I accounted for like charging my phone fully, charging my ipad fully, lamps, a big tv for like 4 hours, xbox the same, and a few other bits and pieces.

I cant remember my hourly usage but I found out that I could run all my things daily off a solar unit excluding cooking and showering as I dont know anyway to calculate it

ShadowFox

ghogie91 wrote: »

I tried calculating this about a month ago

I wouldnt have a million things running but I couldnt account for the power I am using when showering or cooking

I accounted for like charging my phone fully, charging my ipad fully, lamps, a big tv for like 4 hours, xbox the same, and a few other bits and pieces.

I cant remember my hourly usage but I found out that I could run all my things daily off a solar unit excluding cooking and showering as I dont know anyway to calculate it

What size solar unit? when I tried to work out mine to use solar for charging batteries for what id use Id have had to cover my whole estate in panels due to the amount of direct Irish sun. Or did I have it totally wrong??

Khannie

ShadowFox wrote: »

What size solar unit? when I tried to work out mine to use solar for charging batteries for what id use Id have had to cover my whole estate in panels due to the amount of direct Irish sun. Or did I have it totally wrong??

I read a study before done by DIT and you'd get a surprising amount of power from solar here. When ikea announced that they were going to start doing solar it leapt to the top of my list of expensive things to buy. I think it could pay for itself relatively quickly (think "as fast as taking a loan to pay for it").

Our electricity bill is usually substantial enough. The things that use most energy are:
Dryer (we had damp issues when drying clothes on radiators before so during the winter this accounts for a lot)
Fridge (A+ rated, but still....)
Dishwasher (A rated)
Washing machine (A rated)

All our lights are either CFL or LED (moving towards all LED because I love the instant on).

We have a desktop computer but it's not on very often. There is a HTPC that I built that is on about 8 hours a day but it uses < 30W in use and probably < 10 when idle. We have one laptop but it's on its last legs so not used very often.

If electricity went for any reason I'd mostly be interested in the low power stuff like lighting and charging my phone (for entertainment and GPS).

Would love to get a range. Even a stove would do.

thehippychippy

I'll try to stick a link up later when I'm home but there's a boat forum I'm a member of and a guy there made his own stove from 12" box steel, great size for his boat. Something else I'd like to do, eventually ( get the garden finished first, then wash the dog, then me) always something else to damn it

thehippychippy

http://dawncraftowners.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=112&t=5592&p=36625&hilit=Home+made+stove#p36625
That should do it (I think).
Seems like the a good job if your handy with a welder and a grinder

Heroditas

Cork boy 55 wrote: »

Need to replace ancient Desktop PC thinking of getting a laptop for less power consumption, even thou don't require mobility

How much Power does a Traditional desktop PC drain compared to a an average Laptop??

An average laptop typically uses about 25w.

GY A1

thehippychippy wrote: »

http://dawncraftowners.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=112&t=5592&p=36625&hilit=Home+made+stove#p36625
That should do it (I think).
Seems like the a good job if your handy with a welder and a grinder

class
see how red the flue pipe is :eek:

Sh1tbag OToole

You can build an efficient desktop as well if you want, its quite interesting to do and I'm sure the lads in the PC building forum will help. Some very nice low power stuff around these days. A laptop is a fierce awkward thing to use I find, unless you're just laying on the couch or in bed and just looking at stuff or sending the odd message. Then you're living the dream

roughneck

loads

AlanS181824

What an interesting thread. Thanks for this. In France at the minute so can't really say how much I'm using :P