Quote :

"The report concludes that the power used by consoles each year is roughly equal to the annual amount needed to power San Diego. This massive amount of power usage is due to two factors: a) most modern consoles use far more electricity than other types of consumer electronics, and b) Americans have a habit of simply leaving their consoles turned on even when they're not in use. The current generation of consoles offers a wide range of power use profiles: while the Wii is the "juice sipper" of the group, using only 16 watts in its active mode, the 360 and PS3 consoles have been revealed to use a great deal more electricity in their active modes–119 and 150 watts, respectively. That may not mean a lot to the average reader, but the report claims that "a Sony PlayStation 3 or Microsoft Xbox 360 left on 24 hours per day, seven days per week will consume as much electricity each year as two new refrigerators." These power consumption figures aren't all that surprising, partly due to the fact that many owners will use the consoles as media/DVD players and will sometimes forget to turn them off after they've turned off their TV. And because the current generation of consoles doesn't feature easy-to-access power management settings–provided a console has the settings available at all–leaving consoles on in both active and/or idle modes can significantly raise annual electricity bills. According to the study, turning the Wii off after use results in an annual $3 worth of power used vs. $10 if it's left on. The 360's annual electricity cost if turned off is $11 vs. $103 if left on, and for the PS3 the numbers are $12 for turning it off and a whopping $134 per year for leaving it on. [...] The NDRC's report, which totals at 28 pages, also features a number of other suggestions for future steps to help reduce game consoles' energy consumption. Aside from implementing more efficient power supplies and performance scaling with these products, the most effective step could actually be to simply turn on default power-management settings before the units are shipped out from the factories. In the case of the 360, it would also be beneficial to make the settings kick in after 3 hours instead of 6. "Users should not have to 'opt in' in order to improve the energy efficiency of their consoles," the report suggests. By incorporating these practices, the NDRC claims that the United States' electricity bill could be cut by more than $1 billion."

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20081119-the-cost-of-gaming-consoles-use-more-electricity-than-you-think.html
http://www.nrdc.org/energy/consoles/contents.asp

[Edited on December 13, 2008 at 11:16 AM. Reason : ]

12/13/2008 11:15:47 AM

Who the fuck is dumb enough to leave a 360 just sitting there turned on? That's just like asking for three red rings. Or any other number of red ring codes based on overheat.

For that matter, who would leave any console sitting there turned on at all? I don't think I've ever done that in my life but four or five times when I couldn't save and wanted to keep my progress, and maybe once or twice when I just didn't notice. And I think most of those were on consoles I was renting at the time.


But really, though, unless you couldn't save and wanted to play through, why would anyone on earth leave a console turned on? I don't understand that mentality.

12/13/2008 11:24:15 AM

I tend to unplug my consoles when I'm not using them.

12/13/2008 11:57:34 AM

Quote :

"b) Americans have a habit of simply leaving their consoles turned on even when they're not in use. "

I don't know a single person that does this, unless by "turned on" they mean in the standby mode, which I don't think they do (because that'd be idiotic).

[Edited on December 13, 2008 at 12:02 PM. Reason : ]

12/13/2008 12:02:19 PM

I just finished going through the report, and...

Quote :

"The lack of concrete information on usage cycles for video game consoles, and particularly consoles that can also function as DVD players, led us to develop usage scenarios in which 50 percent of users turn off their consoles when they are done playing a game or watching a movie, and 50 percent of users leave the device on continuously."

They made their usage statistics up. Disappointing.

Quote :

"Video game consoles are increasingly called on to perform as high-definition DVD players. We therefore conducted separate tests to compare the power consumption of gaming consoles and stand-alone high-definition DVD players when playing movies. Gaming consoles are sometimes the preferred choice for consumers when buying Blu-ray players because they can be more affordable than stand-alone players and can serve multiple purposes. One study estimates that 75 percent of PS3 owners plan to use their console as their primary movie watching device, meaning that as many as 9.3 million PS3s and/or Xbox 360s are being used in this way."

I probably watch 2, 2 hour movies a week, and my power is about 9.5 cents/kWh.

				Power (W)	kWh/yr		$/yr
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
PS3				148		30.784		$2.91
360				110		22.88		$2.17

Blu-Ray/HD-DVD
	Toshiba			43		8.944		$0.85
	Sony			29		6.032		$0.57
	Pioneer			29		6.032		$0.57
	Pioneer			29		6.032		$0.57
	Sony			27		5.616		$0.53
	Samsung			24		4.992		$0.47	
	Sharp			24		4.992		$0.47
	Denon			20		4.16		$0.39

12/13/2008 12:06:33 PM

I always turn my xbox off immediately when I'm not using it. I did however leave my ps2 on a lot back in the day if I left my memory card at a friends or something

there's been a couple times where my suitemate had his controller connected to mine and he would turn it on when I'd be gone for a weekend and my xbox would be on all weekend.

12/13/2008 12:18:04 PM

Quote :

"For that matter, who would leave any console sitting there turned on at all?"

Nothing wrong with running Folding at Home on the PS3

12/13/2008 1:08:30 PM

i hardly leave anything plugged in

i unplug my laptop when im not using it, my coffee maker, my ipod docking station a and my power strip that contains my tv, dvd player, wii and speakers

my power bills run about $20 a month when im not using my ac

the only things that stay plugged in are the tv in my bedroom because the plug is behind the dresser and my alarm clock, plus appliances obv

12/13/2008 1:14:14 PM

Quote :

"I tend to unplug my consoles when I'm not using them."

12/13/2008 8:43:49 PM

why does my wii start glowing randomly?


is it beckoning me to play with it after a few days?

12/13/2008 8:44:02 PM

Every time I unplug my xbox, or my power goes out, it resets the internal clock to November 22, 2005.

And not only that, until I manually set it, it resets back to November 22, 2005 every time I turn it off.

12/13/2008 8:49:33 PM

^^It does that to notify you there is a new system update.

12/14/2008 3:35:24 AM

^^ That is why I don't unplug mine.

12/14/2008 8:25:30 AM

I don't play video games, so nothing.

How much my computer costs me every year is another story.

12/14/2008 8:48:05 AM

I just woke up and my ps3 is still on, whoops

12/14/2008 9:40:28 AM

i sever the power lines to my house every day before i leave

I'm Big Business and i approved this message.

12/14/2008 9:45:24 AM