How Much Electricity Does a PC Use?

It
was brought up as a question in my household today. How much
electricity does your computer(s) take up? My answer was a somewhat
uncertain, “ummm…not much…”

As usual Google beaconed and I happened onto
this wonderful website that explains just how much power your computer
is taking up at it’s various stages of operation. The author of the website explains in painstaking detail the different measurements with statements like:

“Add another 80 watts for a 17″ CRT monitor, or 35 for an LCD monitor.
Don’t forget related devices. My cable modem uses 7 watts, my D-Link
DI-604 router uses 4.5 watts, and my Motorola phone box for use with
Vonage uses 2 watts while idle (3 when I’m on the phone)”   -Click for
link to site

This website does not tell you how much your
pc is using, but it talks in averages and gives you a good idea. I am
usually pretty good at turning my PC off during the day when I am out
and at night when I am asleep. I had never thought of my Thinkpad
causing much of a power drain, but as it has the same general
components and a Pentium 4 2Ghz processor, maybe it does.

I went ahead and changed my power settings
on both PC’s. If you are not sure how to do this go to your control
panel on a Windows machine and select “Power Options.” While I have
been sitting here, I heard the HDD power down in my Thinkpad and a few
minutes later, the screen went down. The new power management is in
effect.

The website that I found has other questions
that are addressed about laptops, people talking business with multiple
computers and even dispels a few myths. The old “Turning my PC on takes
more energy than leaving it on” is gone.

Tell someone about PC power management, turn it off when you’re not using it and let’s save some energy.