unRaid and your electric bill

A co-worker was able to lend me his Kill-a-Watt meter.
And here are the results:

With the server running and all 5 HDs spun up,..it pulls 175W
With all drives spun down, it drops to 143W

So according to the math where 1 Watt is about $1 per year,....175/12 = $14.58 per month
Of course that assuming constant 175W

With drives spun down 143/12 = 11.92 per month

While this may not break the bank,..in today's economy, I watch my budget very carefully.
If you've seen teenage boys eat, you know what I mean, and I have 2 of them.

I suppose my 2003 MOBO doesn't help,..since it has dual CPU's
I was planning on upgrading the MOBO and RAM anyway because I only have 4 SATA connections.

So,..once I replace these parts,..I'll run this test again and hopefully see a big improvement.

Just tested my HTPC using an A6-3500

Take a guess,.......36W once powered up and stationary.

Of course more wattage would be used once DVDs are played and such, but wow, 36W

(2012-06-13 04:44)GortWillSaveUs Wrote:  Just tested my HTPC using an A6-3500

Take a guess,.......36W once powered up and stationary.

Of course more wattage would be used once DVDs are played and such, but wow, 36W

LOL we all knew that.....

This is the meter that my co-worker let me borrow: P3 International P4480 Kill A Watt Electricity Usage Monitor with Electronic Graphic Timer $27.27



This worked awesomely and I'll be picking up my own, so I can return this one.

These are my A6-PACK readings (64GB SSD/4GB RAM):

Very cool. In today's economy,..I think this information is extremely helpful, since no one likes surprises on any bills they receive.

My Freenas server, Phenom II X2 250, 16GB ram, 450W PS, 6x2TB hard disks. It idles around 65W when I used my power meter. It ramps up to about 90W when the HDDs aren't sleeping and up to about 140W when it's cranking out. I leave it on 24/7.

Good thing I live in the hydro electric capital of the world, British Coluimbia Canada where electricity is 6.8 cents/KWh.

Anyways, $30 a month seems high, as suggested I would use a kill-a-watt or similar device to measure your actual power usage.

(2012-06-11 17:37)wsume99 Wrote:  My server idles at ~40w. If you assume $.11/kWHr (which is about the US average) that equates to ~$40/year. If I were you I'd invest in a kill-a-watt meter before you make any changes. I would certainly think that you would see much less power use from a newer system. One of the best chips for a cheap, low power unraid server is the intel celeron G530.

(2012-06-11 18:50)Tycho91 Wrote:  Why not switch to WHS v1? Can run on 1gb, no graphics card and can use LightsOut for powermanagement?

Interesting set of numbers. I'll make a note of this Low power CPU

(2012-06-15 10:03)crashnburn Wrote:  

(2012-06-11 17:37)wsume99 Wrote:  My server idles at ~40w. If you assume $.11/kWHr (which is about the US average) that equates to ~$40/year. If I were you I'd invest in a kill-a-watt meter before you make any changes. I would certainly think that you would see much less power use from a newer system. One of the best chips for a cheap, low power unraid server is the intel celeron G530.

Interesting set of numbers. I'll make a note of this Low power CPU

I just want to clear up any confusion - I have an E5500 CPU in my server today NOT a G530. If I were going to build another server today I'd use a G530 and I'm certain that it would draw less power than my current setup.