Columns Performance per what?

They are in very limited supply though.

 

You don't need a 1kW PSU to power that system - you need about 500-600W for comfort. What you need a 1kW PSU for is a quad-core, SLi/Crossfire top-end setup with a shedload of drives and wasteful chipset'd mobo's, with beefy overclocks. Alright they might not be running at 100% load all the time, but that's never a good idea with power regulation systems anyway.

 

You need a 1kW unit for AMD's Quad FX platform with SLI and/or CrossFire.

 

While I see where this article is coming from, I don't really agree. So long as there is the ability to cool components for a reasonable ammount of money(I.E. not water or phase cooling on stock gear) they will use increasingly more electricity. This has overall, been happening over time, back since the days of CPU's that barely needed even a passive heatsink.

Power consumption imo is pretty much not worried about by companies, so long as the heat that that generates can be taken care off and it's not horrendous. The general gamersphere has been so noobish regarding speccing of PSU's in the last few years that everyone has hundreds of watts to spare anyway - so what company would mind using those up?

Anyone who genuinely thinks that the environment is in serious danger and that the only solution is to stop using electricity shouldn't be using a high end PC, what with all those dangerous metals and unrenewable whatevers - not to mention the power usage. For the rest of us, this isn't really an issue beyond heat and PSUs, and so far, companies seem to be managing to keep that under control, and within the massively overspecced margins 99% of people have.

 

Any energy which comes out as heat is wasted the bigger the HSF, the higher the temperature the more waste energy!

 

I don't think (personally) that the whole point of being a bit more frugal with power resources is about saving the environment, or helping the dolphins or whatever, it's about not being pointlessly wasteful. If you can make a product less wasteful, even for that extra bit of effort, why not?

Even if you disregard the possible environmental issues of gamers everywhere running 1kW machines in a few years, what about the personal cost? PC's are expensive enough to run in depreciation as it is, let alone having a massive power bill come through every quarter for your gaming pleasure.

 

Yeah, but I think if the companies could make products more efficient for a little more effort they probably would. I'd love that, I love efficiency in general.

In the case of high end graphics and CPU's though, I think it would require total redesigns of some of the components, and even then if you're going to limit the wattage they can go through to any real extent I imagine you'd be forced to limit performance too. You can ask: Who wants lower power components? Everyone will say "YES!". Then ask: Who wants lower power components at the expense of performance?" - Not many takers there I imagine.

Bottom line is that we're pretty much getting what we want. When we care enough about power usage, efficiency, and less so about performance, I'm sure a company will be along shortly afterward to fill that niché.

 

I'm not asking for power consumption to necessarily drop (although it can be done), I'm asking for it to stop going up. Why do we see higher power consumption every generation? For example, notebook power consumption remains pretty constant and we actually see "better performance per watt in the same power envelope" or even less in some cases - why can't we see that on the desktop at the high-end too?

I'm sure ATI and Nvidia could potentially make 500W graphics cards today that are twice as powerful as current cards, but we all know that's not responsible. By the same token, why do we keep going up by 20-30W every generation - it's costing more to own a high end PC every year (not just in terms of increased component prices and faster technology progressions), even if you don't game 24 hours a day.

 

You can add some more questions to the "why" Tim...

Why dont they release GPU's after there is actually a game ready to run it on (yet) They can finetune the gpu core into the finist detail and it would probably be more powerfull and energie eficient then ever before.

Why buy a SLI motherboard configuration if one is more then adequate to handle all the games that are released now and propbably the rest of the year?

The simple answer is consumer demand. But its not that simple because consumers are being brainwashed for decades to actually buy something they really dont need anyway...

But that is not the road we folow here in the topic. The fact is that all Highend hardware is consuming an enourmus amount of power that is bad for your wallet (twice!). One when buying hardware and two for the electric bills and in the end also the enviroment.

Why can they fit a 8800 into a freaking laptop and desktop users must buy bigger cases for a 8800 graca that is the size of a laptop? I dont get it... really i dont

edit: to Identikit: I removed the quadcore/software, now try again to answer

 

What's with all the SMP bashing lately?

Of course there's loads of software that supports more than one CPU/core. Why do you think it's been around since the P3 days?

 

I for one would be most interested in the actual PSU requirements are required as well as the minimum you could A) realistically run with and B) how low you could go!
The test wouldn't need to include overclocked equipment as that's running the hardware out of spec.

 

All this debate about your computer PSU and how they consume energy is useless.

Did you take a look to a datacenter ??

Server and mainframe, have 2K, 4K , 8K PSU with multiple connection for redundancy, everything run at maximum for performance, and the server is never stopped.
And they totally don't care about saving energy, yes there is new HP server and IBM who consume less with energy saving activated, but even with that server will always run and never be stopped and the saving mode consumption is quite high even with that.

There is server here in the hosting room (and is a very little hosting room with little server), and some of them have three PSU consuming 2Kw each 24/24.
But take a mainframe with four or five PSU 2/3 KW each, plus the PSU dedicated for the disk bay (4 PSU 3K each) and double all of that for clustering and you will start to see where its go.


So your poor 1Kw PSU running half a day (or even 24/24 if you are a geek) will be so ridiculous in comparison of a clustered mainframe running 24/24 all years at full performance for example that.

Its like believing the USA its the only producer of carbon, people forgot most of the time the Chinese friend who don't give a **** about ecology.
(don't make me wrong, i don't say USA are innocent angels)

But power grinding computer and ecology is something not compatible even with a good driver.

 

fleole: Agreed. It's like somebody recycling a bottle, but the guy next door throwing away twice as many. But does that mean that we shouldn't give a crap, just because someone out there is worse at it? No, everybody needs to be aware of their effects on the environment.

I recycle all my old electronics and printer cartridges. But I'm not in the position (at the moment) to recycle more. In a couple of months I'll be moving to a new house and so I'll be able to recycle a lot of things. In doing so I'm hoping to reduce the effect of running my computers 24/7.

(I do folding at home 24/7 so catch 22, but it's worth it. (Join the team))

 

I like the way that Tims saying that Power Consumption should come down (and looks primarily at AMD/ATi) but they have now got new ads for ATi Crossfire!

 

I don't sell ads, I just publish content.

 

Marketing, that's why. The same reason a Radeon X1650Pro has a bigger heat sink than a Radeon 9800Pro, despite running 3 Watts cooler.

 

How about system makers taking on Apple-esque products? Only need a PC for web-browsing and email? How about a 'laptop' without a screen or keyboard that plugs into your telly? Low cost, low power consumption and no need for a monitor.

Sony marketing a PS3/PC hybrid. The PS3 has the capabilites. It can already run Linux. Combine games and work?

 

I read all the posts here.. NOT A SINGLE PERSON noted about the HANDY feature that has been implemented since the day of ATX and my old K6-2 450 called STAND BY.

A few clicks and poof your 1kw drawing system is pulling less than 10w (Kill-a-watt confirmed on my SLI rig) and a quick tap of the power button and poof! A system instantly back up and running where you left off.

you want that fast PC y our going to pay for it in power usage.

An argument about making computers more power-eco-friendly is a farce. The whole human involvement in global warming is a political scam (look at Al Gore! ...nutcase...). Global warming would continue to happen even if we cut our emissions to 0 today. The best thing we can do is prepare. Yes I live in the US, but dont label me as a energy hungry nut or not caring about green house gasses. My family just bought a new family car that gets 36mpg highway and 26 city. As a family we work very hard at conserving power too. Our business shop has R-50 in the walls and R-50 in the ceiling. Power usage is a concern to many Americans.

 

Jesus dude, that's it! After billions spent on research by proponents of both sides and by actual scientists, after hundreds of thousands of man hours spent studying all the available data, after all the inconclusive findings and reports coming out on both sides of the arguement, you've somehow managed to cut through all the crap and deliver the answer.

Well, that, or you're picking sides based upon preference. But no doubt it's the first, right?

 

I think power consumption is an issue with regards to consumer-level stuff (for example, I'd like it if my 2.4ghz single core box was running a little cooler, saving me some cash and not making as much noise), but the type of person who is spending $500 on a brand new top of the line video card probably doesn't mind spending a bit more on power.

I'm sure they could find ways to make their high-end products cooler, but will it really make a difference? Less than 1% of people actually own the high-end computer stuff. Most people have the $500 Dell special.

It's in the midline stuff where power consumption is an issue.

Let's use another car analogy. In the midsize family sedan market, fuel economy is a very important issue to most customers. But in the $50,000 sports car market, it doesn't really make a difference.

While I agree with our point, it's like saying the Corvette should be designed for better gas mileage. People who can't afford to pay for gas don't spend $50k on a car.

On the same token, someone who is spending several grand on a top-end gaming rig can probably afford to spend more on the power bills. If they wanted something that was cheap to run, they would have a $500 Dell special.