Mailing List Archive

MythTV box video card power usage
I have recently been upgrading my PCs with more modern video cards,
due mostly to Nvidia dropping driver support for the ancient ones I
have been using for the last 8-9 years. So I changed the card in my
main MythTV box from an Asus Bravo 220 (Nvidia GT220) to an Asus
GT1030-SL-2G-BRK (Nvidia GT1030). Both cards are silent (fanless)
models. Then a couple of days ago, I had reason to check the power
usage of that PC. It uses a Corsair RM650i 80+ Gold power supply,
which has internal monitoring and tells me the current power usage,
like this:

root@mypvr:~# OpenCorsairLink --device 0
Dev=0, CorsairLink Device Found: RM650i!

Vendor: CORSAIR
Product: RM650i
Firmware: NA
Temperature 0: 36.59 C
Temperature 1: 28.91 C
Powered: 77069429 (892d. 0h)
Uptime: 526229 (6d. 2h)
Supply Voltage: 230.00 V
Total Watts: 112.00 W
Output 12v:
Voltage 12.16 V
Amps 6.50 A
Watts 80.00 W
Output 5v:
Voltage 4.94 V
Amps 4.75 A
Watts 23.00 W
Output 3.3v:
Voltage 3.31 V
Amps 3.88 A
Watts 13.00 W

So it is currently drawing 112 watts, while recording 3 programmes.
That is way below what it used to draw, before I changed the video
card. Typical usage when doing significant recording was around 140
W, and seemed to max out at about 148 W. And even better, when it is
not recording and is basically just idle, the usage reported is now
only 80 W. Before that was around 120-125 W.

So most of the time, the reported power usage is around 40 W less than
with the old video card. For a PC that is on 24/7, that adds up to
quite a bit. Over a year, 40 W less is 350.64 kWhr of electricity not
used. At my current electricity cost (with all taxes and discounts)
of NZ$0.27039 / kWhr, that works out to be NZ$94.81. The cost of the
new video card was NZ$147.92, so it will pay for itself in just over a
year and a half. And I expect to keep using it for quite a few years,
so it is going to be a pretty good investment.

Given that a lot of MythTV boxes are on 24/7, if you still have an
older video card, it might be a good idea to upgrade now.

BTW I have checked the power measurements given by the power supply
against an external meter and they matched very well.
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