[mythtv-users] Requesting some sample kill a watt meter numbers

[Michael T. Dean]

  On 01/18/2011 10:48 AM, Joe Hickey wrote:
> I think the answer to my question is: if I want to substantially
> reduce that number I have to look toward the atoms,

No.  If you want to substantially reduce the power consumption, you need 
to shut down the system when not in use.

>   and give up on the
> idea of having commflag jobs complete in a anywhere near real time (or
> possibly just have it fire up this box when needed).  Something to
> think about.... I've been looking for a project lately.

Note that a MythTV developer (who isn't currently able to send an e-mail 
to this list--and I'll leave out names to protect the innocent) 
mentioned in IRC, early this morning, that his Mac Mini idles at lower 
than the 20W that many are quoting for their Atom-based systems.  (Note, 
also, that you can easily find the conversation in the MythTV IRC 
channel logs if you're so inclined, or pop into IRC and I'm sure several 
of us can help you find it or give you similar thoughts on it.)

AIUI, the Atom is purposely designed as a low-cost, low-transitor-count 
processor, so most of the power-saving goodies that allow real 
processors to idle at low power usage were removed.  Instead, it's 
pretty much a processor with a small range of power draw (meaning not 
far off max power draw) and marketing only gets away with calling it 
"low power" because they chopped off the headroom--you /can't/ draw high 
power (but even when your at load, you're not accomplishing as much as, 
say a system with a nice Core 2 Duo that may hit higher power draw, but 
for significantly smaller times--and may idle at equivalent or lower 
power draw...).

Mike

In the interest of full disclosure, I am a confirmed Atom hater.