[mythtv-users] Lowest power HD frontend?

Raymond Wagner raymond at wagnerrp.com
Tue May 28 19:46:59 UTC 2013


On 5/28/2013 2:01 PM, Jeff Siddall wrote:
> I just went and measured my IONITX fronted and it idles at 23 W and 
> peaks at 28 W when playing 1080p video.

Last time I checked, my 55W TDP system was runing 25W idle and 32W 
playing 1080p video.  45W was the absolute maximum I managed to coax out 
of it.  Had I gotten a DC-DC power supply (like a PicoPSU) with an 
external brick, I could be running around half that within the case 
itself, and stored the brick behind my cabinet in the open air.

Even still, you're never going to end up with an expensive pile of 
melted plastic.  All modern x86 CPUs (a term to which Atoms do not 
qualify) have a "boost" mode, where thermal sensors will determine the 
amount of headroom a CPU has, and dynamically exceed its rated speed.  
While the lower end Pentiums and Celerons have this disabled, they still 
have the reverse where the CPU will drop below its rated speed if it has 
exceeded its thermal limts.  You can take the heatsink off a modern CPU 
and all it will do is downclock itself to maintain that stability margin.


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