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Post by jedinite24 on Jan 16, 2010 16:12:28 GMT -5
Having a Kill-A-Watt is addicting and can sometimes make you wonder about your gear. I got a Kill A Watt EZ from Costco and I've been double checking the consumption of a lot of things around the house. I've got a Hafler DH-500 and I love how it sounds but when idle it draws 230 watts from the socket and when I turn up the music it draws up to 240 watts. I have a Hafler XL-280 and it draws approx 100 to 122 watts depending on how loudly I turn up the music. The utility company really is going to love me now. I like listening to both Haflers. What stinks too is the warm up time. Oh well. JD
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 17, 2010 8:08:09 GMT -5
Having a Kill-A-Watt is addicting and can sometimes make you wonder about your gear. I got a Kill A Watt EZ from Costco and I've been double checking the consumption of a lot of things around the house. I've got a Hafler DH-500 and I love how it sounds but when idle it draws 230 watts from the socket and when I turn up the music it draws up to 240 watts. I have a Hafler XL-280 and it draws approx 100 to 122 watts depending on how loudly I turn up the music. The utility company really is going to love me now. I like listening to both Haflers. What stinks too is the warm up time. Oh well. JD damn . . . I think I'd do the same if I had one . . . the curiosity is infectious . . lol
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Post by Cory Cooper on Jan 10, 2014 14:02:45 GMT -5
I received a Kill A Watt EZ for Christmas. Due to the "surprise" light snow today, I figured I would test my audio gear out for fun. All wattage readings were taken as an average over a five minute period. LegendModel: off (rear/front switches off with no status lights)- standby (rear power switch on/front switch off with amber status light) - on with no signal (blue status light on front) Emotiva UMC-1: 0.0 - 1.2 - 28.8 Emotiva XPA-5: 0.0 - 2.5 - 70.1 (during the first few mins, this number steadily declines from the upper 80s to this pretty steady reading) Emotiva Ultra Sub 12: 0.0 - 9.2 - 9.2 (strange that this one is the same in standby and on with no signal - hmmm?) OPPO BDP-95: 0.15 (there is no rear power switch, so off would be unplugged) - 0.15 (red status light on front) - 30.4 I didn't measure wattage during actual usage, as my enjoyment outweighs the cost in that regard. This project was more for calculating the daily/monthly kWh and cost for leaving them powered on vs standby 24/7. Quite interesting findings IMHO. I really love the Kill A Watt unit and recommend it highly. Due to the very cold winter this year, and my liberal use of portable heaters, my electricity bill was over $300! So, I have been measuring everything around the house in an effort to lower the bill for the coming months. Heating and cooling is a major expenditure in a poorly insulated, mostly original house built in 1850. I guess it is gonna require the use of more sweaters and blankets, instead of portable electric heaters. And we won't even get into heating oil cost/usage! I am off to measure more stuff. Enjoy, C
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KeithL
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Post by KeithL on Jan 10, 2014 15:34:57 GMT -5
Actually they do come in various models and colors In fact there are other models (and ones made by other companies) that can do even fancier stuff - like record a graph of power usage over time. Most of our newer amps (and other equipment) draw less than 1 watt in standby (which is the new CE standard). All of our equipment should be zero with the rear panel power switch off. (The DC-1 doesn't really sleep when you put it in standby, and so draws about 10 watts.)
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KeithL
Administrator
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Post by KeithL on Jan 10, 2014 15:38:03 GMT -5
I think you will find that the cost of running an electric heater FAR overshadows the cost of running any amplifier. Air conditioners are another major power eater... and OLD refrigerators... although some modern refrigerators are not too bad. And don't forget those light bulbs that stay on a lot; a 30 watt porch lamp doesn't use much power, but it adds up; replace it with a Cree LED bulb (the "40 watt equivalent" one uses about 9 watts). I received a Kill A Watt EZ for Christmas. Due to the "surprise" light snow today, I figured I would test my audio gear out for fun. All wattage readings were taken as an average over a five minute period. LegendModel: off (rear/front switches off with no status lights)- standby (rear power switch on/front switch off with amber status light) - on with no signal (blue status light on front) Emotiva UMC-1: 0.0 - 1.2 - 28.8 Emotiva XPA-5: 0.0 - 2.5 - 70.1 (during the first few mins, this number steadily declines from the upper 80s to this pretty steady reading) Emotiva Ultra Sub 12: 0.0 - 9.2 - 9.2 (strange that this one is the same in standby and on with no signal - hmmm?) OPPO BDP-95: 0.15 (there is no rear power switch, so off would be unplugged) - 0.15 (red status light on front) - 30.4 I didn't measure wattage during actual usage, as my enjoyment outweighs the cost in that regard. This project was more for calculating the daily/monthly kWh and cost for leaving them powered on vs standby 24/7. Quite interesting findings IMHO. I really love the Kill A Watt unit and recommend it highly. Due to the very cold winter this year, and my liberal use of portable heaters, my electricity bill was over $300! So, I have been measuring everything around the house in an effort to lower the bill for the coming months. Heating and cooling is a major expenditure in a poorly insulated, mostly original house built in 1850. I guess it is gonna require the use of more sweaters and blankets, instead of portable electric heaters. And we won't even get into heating oil cost/usage! I am off to measure more stuff. Enjoy, C
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Post by Cogito on Jan 24, 2014 11:33:06 GMT -5
I use an APC G5BLK EMI/RFI power filter with great results. I can monitor line voltage and amperage draw of my components via a nifty alphanumeric LCD display. It also features sequenced off/on features. I bought mine from Vanns about a year ago for under $100.00. Nice solid unit and it looks great in my rack.
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Post by Jim on Jan 24, 2014 11:50:09 GMT -5
I use an APC G5BLK EMI/RFI power filter with great results. I can monitor line voltage and amperage draw of my components via a nifty alphanumeric LCD display. It also features sequenced off/on features. I bought mine from Vanns about a year ago for under $100.00. Nice solid unit and it looks great in my rack. That's sweet. I like APC gear, well built, just works. I have an APC H15 that has some similar features That's a pretty good deal for about $100.
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Post by leonski on Jan 29, 2014 0:02:14 GMT -5
The ONE feature NOBODY has yet mentioned is PF….This is Power Factor. On the basic Kill-a-Watt, it shares the Hz function, which in the US should NEVER vary from 60. While you may be concerned with 'watts' = volts x amps….you should be more concerned with VA….measured by multiplying the 'watts' used by 1/power factor.
For example, you may like the small fluorescent lamps which draw say…..13 watts. But the REAL load maybe as high as 18VA, which is a power factor of .72 and almost a 45 degree displacement between voltage and current. Scale this up to an amp drawing 300 watts and over 400VA. It is easy to see how this effects maximum power you are REALLY able to draw from your wall outlet…and even your whole house service. It's even worse for speakers where you may have OVER 45 degrees of phase angle at some very low impedance. If the amp is not capable of driving this particular combination, bad for you…...
Factories and large industrial users care about this measure. IF they have too low a power factor, the power company can apply a surcharge to the bill. As a result, power factor correction may be advised for such large electricity users.
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Post by sme on Jan 30, 2014 2:15:04 GMT -5
VA is definitely the right quantity for circuit load calculations, but real power is probably more relevant for this discussion. The real power is what one pays for when it's turned on. The amount of heat dissipated is also, ultimately, limited by the real power consumed.
I'm guessing that capacitance in a good amp helps buffer out-of-phase current demands by speakers to keep the power factor, with respect to the mains supply, fairly close to 1. I would imagine significant variations from 1 would tend to happen only when an amp is driven beyond its limits.
I can't find my Kill-a-Watt, but I do recall measuring much of my electrical equipment with it. My old Denon 2112 CI AVR (with builtin amps) idled at 40-45ish W with a PF very near 1. I think the only item I measured that had a PF far from 1 was my Zoom (brand) cable modem. This is going by memory, but I think it had a PF of ~0.4, which seems absurd to me (not an EE or electronics expert). Why does it seem like any electronics made to deal with cable are total trash? Thankfully it's fairly low power (10 W real?). Maybe I should look for a replacement power supply for it?
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Post by leonski on Feb 3, 2014 1:11:15 GMT -5
'Real Power'? I could be wrong here, but my understanding is that you get BILLED for watts and USE VA. So, with with lower PF, you will use more power while getting billed for less. This is why a large factory with a low power factor may get a surcharge tacked on to the 'regular' bill. They are not yet to the point of worrying about that for home power consumers. I wonder if the new generation of meter can take PF vs Watts data? The day may come when we ALL get billed for low power factor loads. As far as measured data goes, my iMac is PF of about.98 which is nearly pure resistive. A 4' fluorescent tube in my room STARTS with a very low PF but goes higher as it warms up. I forget the actual values. Maybe if I get motivated I'll take some measures of my stereo. I have a 'd' amp with a SMPS per channel.
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Post by sme on Feb 7, 2014 1:40:37 GMT -5
It's not that you use VA either. VA is a measure of how quickly energy is being moved. Watts is a measure of how quickly energy is being consumed. When the power factor is low the extra apparent power (VA) above the real power (Watts) describes how quickly energy is oscillating back and forth between your equipment/appliance and the power network. The power network has to be capable of giving you that extra energy, on the upswing, even though you're not consuming it, and when your equipment sends that energy back, the power network must be capable of accepting it while maintaining stability. I don't think this a big deal for residential users where most loads have power factor near 1, but heavy industry may be major consumers of power with low power factors, and the power company must provision for them accordingly.
Analogously, a speaker with a strong phase shift may tend to want to push and pull a lot more energy than it consumes, and this can cause problems without a good amplifier design that can provide that extra energy and then accept it when it comes back.
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Post by leonski on Feb 9, 2014 10:48:37 GMT -5
BINGO: And 2 amps which measure the same into a resistor may (or rather WILL) not measure the same into a 'real world' reactive load. That's where it gets interesting and reputations are made. I'm not so sure about accepting energy when it comes back. If the Damping Factor is high, this means the resistance is LOW and the speaker basically self-damps. The old paper clip test works here. 'flick' your woofer cone with a finger. Without connection, it's gonna' make a lot more noise and move more than if you have the speaker SHORTED with a short piece of wire…. My panels don't store much energy and don't respond well to ths sort of test. For those interested in a different way to test amplifier power….look up 'Power Cube'….
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