Power consumption of the various consoles..

[Rangers]

http://www.hardcoreware.net/reviews/review-356-1.htm

So now you know approximately how much power the 3 new consoles consume. Some of the more interesting notes to me were:

* In video games, both the PS3 and XBOX 360 were relatively low compared to a mid-to-high range PC.
* The Wii is amazingly efficient, using no more than 18 Watts in any of our tests (although it really shows in visual quality in games)
* Both consoles are power hogs when it comes to playing movies.
* XBOX 360's Dashboard console is power-hungry (and slow). PS3's is slick and uses a lot of power, but no more than playing a DVD.

Pretty interesting. Look at the massive difference between 360/PS3 and Wii..in case you were wondering, that's a big generational gap.

It appears PS3 uses slightly more than 360, but just slightly.

And also a damn beefy PC not drawing much more.

Basically one of the main things they discovered is just playing in the dashboard or a DVD uses a lot of power on PS3/360. Almost as much as gameplay.

 

[Acert93]

Great post. This proves it: The Wii is the environmental friendly console. Get Al Gore on the phone!

 

[bomlat]

20 hours gameplay on pc/xb2/ps3 is consume 1 kg of coal.
A hard core gamer coal consumption is 2 kg/week,or 8-10 kg /moth.
If somebody don't shut down the xb2 or hte ps3, but use it for downloading the coal consumption can be 8kg/week, or 32 kg/mont.(aprox 16 phoun and 64 phound)

Of course I calculat with high quality coa, if somebody use low quality coal for the consoles the coal consumption will be higher by 20-100%.

(the main electricity source in te us is the coal)

 

[infinity4]

imagine power consumption if they run pc with 8800GTX

 

[Entropy]

Pretty interesting. Look at the massive difference between 360/PS3 and Wii..in case you were wondering, that's a big generational gap.

I don't really understand what you mean by generational gap. Is the more energy efficient device a generation ahead? Or behind? Is it a meaningful term at all in this context?

There is a huge difference, roughly a factor ten between the Wii and the other two, clearly demonstrating an alternative design ethos, one which in terms of power waste at least is clearly superior.

Basically one of the main things they discovered is just playing in the dashboard or a DVD uses a lot of power on PS3/360. Almost as much as gameplay.

Which is remarkably bad engineering, from an energy standpoint. The technology to reduce power draw for these scenarios has been widely deployed in other low cost places for a long time now. The results are so disappointing, I would almost question if there was a methodology error when making the measurements. Unfortunately results in different places match up.

 

[Npl]

I already wondered why the PS3 has such high idle powerdraw. Cell is supposed to excell in saving power when idle, and the G7x line should have something in place too.

 

[Rainbow Man]

Great post.

Yuop! Thanks Rangers!

This proves it: The Wii is the environmental friendly console. Get Al Gore on the phone!

Hee hee.

Jokes aside you do have a point there. Not onyl is Wii the most power efficient it is also the smallest and lightest so it uses the least amount of real-world resources in production and transport as well..

If one would have wantd to really hammer home the message of an envirnmentally friendly console I guess Wii should have launched with a popup lid drive like the Gamecube for example and no Wii24 standby moe.

Then again I don't think making those choices and then actively marketing the thing as an earth-friendly green console would have produced any extra sales. Rather I think the current very stylish and slick design helps sales much more.. So from a purely commercial standpoint Nintendo seems to have made the correct choices.

Then again the further savings that could have been made are probably fairly minimal..

Peace.

 

[hey69]

and i bet the psp is using even less power.. whats the point mixing the Wii in these charts?
should have compared the wii with xbox - ps2 - gamecube

 

[DuckThor Evil]

There is a huge difference, roughly a factor ten between the Wii and the other two, clearly demonstrating an alternative design ethos, one which in terms of power waste at least is clearly superior.

With little power comes little power draw. Wii might be using 1/10 of the power, but does it have 1/10 of the power?

 

[Pete]

should have compared the wii with xbox - ps2 - gamecube

Though there'll be some variation b/w tests, it seems to beat them all in power draw while gaming, though I don't think they tested the new PStwo b/c they mention not using the HD add-on (which IIRC isn't an option for the redesign).

It'd be just as interesting to see how the 360 and PS3 redesigns (process shrinks) fare. I guess the Wii-design (yukyuk) can work on standby power relative to the previous (not sure if that should be in quotes) gen.

 

[22psi]

Yeah I use my 360 to heat my condo when it's cold outside!

 

[Entropy]

With little power comes little power draw. Wii might be using 1/10 of the power, but does it have 1/10 of the power?

A more relevant question might be if it provides only 1/10 the fun. These devices are toys, "efficiency" should relate to their intended use. The question is of course impossible to answer quantitatively. (Judging by customer reports, the degree of fun provided by the Wii is typically regarded to be higher than provided by the alternatives, making it the fastest selling console right now. Be that as it may, I think we can safely say that there is no apparent correlation between power draw and ability to provide entertainment, and the environmental/ergonomic advantages of low power draw are obvious.)

 

[Cheezdoodles]

imagine power consumption if they run pc with 8800GTX

i thought that came with a portable nuclear generator?

 

[wsippel]

and i bet the psp is using even less power.. whats the point mixing the Wii in these charts?

They tested 7th generation home consoles?

should have compared the wii with xbox - ps2 - gamecube

Why? Those are 6th generation systems...

 

[Arwin]

It will be interesting to see if we can already see a difference between the PAL and the NTSC PS3s ...

 

[StefanS]

This is thread is about power consumption in the technology section! This is hugely off-topic. If you want to, I can move some of the posts to a new thread in the console talk forum. Otherwise, please stay on topic.

 

[Dregun]

I find these numbers very interesting, I could have sworn I was told that the Wii gets fairly warm even when idle. I know Heat does not = Power draw but efficiency....well?? I really thought Wii would have consumed more power but am not surprised that the PS3 is bleeding the natural resources from underneath us.

I can see the news reports now...
"In other news tonight, major power companies are asking for Your help to reduce the heavy load being placed upon their facilities over the past few weeks. If your watching at home please limit the amount of time using the PS3 or 360 as many homes are experiencing black outs. Some riots have erupted and a truck driver was beaten as one assailant threw a 360 through his window while the other assailant repeatedly hit him with a PS3 attached with a Wii wrist strap"

I would really like to know what part of each machine is consuming the most power. It would seem that the most likely culprit would be the GPU's, however what is causing the increase in the PS3? Does the Core systems use less power then the 60GB-PS3/20GB-360? How does the Wii relate to the GC, shouldn't it be the same considering the die shrinks are compensated by the increased power and light bar?

 

[Capeta]

I find these numbers very interesting, I could have sworn I was told that the Wii gets fairly warm even when idle. I know Heat does not = Power draw but efficiency....well??

The Wii gets warm in WiiConnect 24 mode because the fan is turned off.

 

[Rainbow Man]

Let's not go overboard in exaggerations about these power draw figures.

360 or PS3 draw is only about the equivalent of two rather ordinary light bulbs (75W). It's obviously less than two 90W or more bulbs which are also common.

You can buy 500W halogen lights for home use in many places..

Wii gets a litte warm I guess because in standby mode the fan isn't spinning. During actual gameplay when the tiny fan spins my wii does not get noticeably warm. Or well I haven't noticed it anyway hehe.

 

[Entropy]

Let's not go overboard in exaggerations about these power draw figures.

360 or PS3 draw is only about the equivalent of two rather ordinary light bulbs (75W). It's obviously less than two 90W or more bulbs which are also common.

Conversely, if you change to low energy lamps, the 360 and PS3 at idle draw as energy as the lightning of a typical family home. The at idle is the truly remarkable part. (I'm more surprised at Sony than Microsoft to be honest, since they have such a strong background in home appliances.)

Regardless of environmental concerns (and some people are justifiably concerned about the environment), factors such as energy cost and convection cooling airflow noise and size requirements are quite matter of fact, and it is interesting to note the differences in approach of the respective manufacturers in making these entertainment devices.

To what extent this will afffect either the market or usage pattern is hard to say. I'm sure that if Nintendo marketed their environmental advantage "Twice the fun - one tenth the energy cost!" or some such, it could really only be picked up as a positive by the public. While a lot of people don't really care, particularly those that don't pay their own bills, nobody really feels waste is a positive.

Personally, my PC at home draws just over 400W from the wall when active and 200W in standby, my elderly 17" lamp iMac draws 70W going full tilt and 5W when asleep and is totally quiet in that mode. So I tend to shut down the PC when I don't use it, vs. just telling the iMac to go to sleep (and it also wakes up a lot faster). This of course means that the iMac sees a lot more use, since for web browsing, mail, et cetera the additional oomph of the state of the art PC over the old iMac just doesn't matter - just as in idle, the additional shading power of a PS3 or 360 over a wii is completely irrelevant.

So from personal experience I'd say that Nintendo probably could market their advantage and get strong positive consumer recognition from it, and that it actually could make a difference (for some people) in how they use these devices. Nintendo obviously aims for adults in their emphasis of quick and effective weather and news access, and it would be ironic if the small power-miserly Wii ended up as more of an always accessible appliance then either of the two consoles with "living room entertainment center" aspirations.

Energy design decisions matter IMHO.