UPDATED August 6, 2008: I have re-measured some of these values with a new meter, and also measured the power usage of a Core 2 Quad PC built to replace the Athlon box described below. See this post for more.

Today I bought a Mains Power Meter, model MS6115 from Jaycar Electronics. They finally arrived in stock - I’d been waiting for one of these since before Christmas of 2006. The principle of the thing is that it plugs into the power outlet, and you then plug an appliance (or appliances, if you use a powerboard) into the socket on the meter. Dan’s Data has reviewed one of these just recently - I suggest you have a look there for more detail than I will be able to provide.

I started testing a few things around the house to see how much juice they draw, and got a few surprises. First of all, the voltage it read was 290V - from a 230ish volt outlet. This was a bit curious. Plugging in a kettle and starting it off then gave me a maximum reading of 2984 Watts. Hmm. Switching over to the Amp reading screen showed it was pulling just over 10 Amps, which makes more sense.

Next to try was the home theatre setup, consisting of a 76cm widescreen CRT TV, high Definition set top box, dvd player, video recorder, receiver and 5 speakers plus a subwoofer (more info about the setup can be read in an earlier post). The results are as follows:

Home Theatre Power Consumption
All items on standby: 31 Watts
All items on standby, except set top box on: 43W
TV and set top box on: 172W
TV, set top box and receiver on: 197W

Wife’s PC: Athlon XP 2500+, running at 9x200MHz (1800MHz), Abit NF7-S, Radeon 9700, 19″ Samsung 930BF

PC and screen in standby: 37W
PC and screen on, idle at Windows desktop: 168W
As above, folding@home client running: 178W
As above, folding@home and 3DMark2001SE demo running at 1024x768, speakers on: 181W

Server: Pentium 233MMX
On, idle: 40W

My PC: Core 2 Duo E6300 @ 7x350 (2450MHz), Abit AB9, GeForce 7300GT, 19″ Viewsonic VX912

PC standby, server off, router (Netgear RP614) & Modem (Standard Optus Cable) on: 22W
PC on and idle, server on: 99W
PC on, idle, screen off, server on: 82W
All on, Folding@Home running: Max 99W (0.34A)
All on, folding, mythtv watching live TV, stereo on: 96W

That was a shock to see how much more power the older system used than my new dual core box, considering how much more powerful the Core 2 Duo is. It really shows the progress made in making new systems more energy efficient. I think the time may have come to upgrade the Athlon box…