MediaMVP & Energy Saving Strategies

[bendrl]

I have a MVP in the living room connected to a my GBPVR computer in the basement. I'm trying to configure the system so that I can save as much energy as possible without jumping through too many hoops like running to the basement to power on the computer. Currently, I have the computer automatically shut itself off at 11PM via software and automatically turn on at 6AM (via BIOS) since I don't recording late night TV programs. TV listings are updated during the daytime. The hard drives are also powered off when the computer is not busy. Is there anything else I can do? I presume that if I turned on suspend or hibernate, the MVP would not be able to wake the computer up. Any suggestions? Thanks!

[homerjatmoes]

I have a MVP in the living room connected to a my GBPVR computer in the basement. I'm trying to configure the system so that I can save as much energy as possible without jumping through too many hoops like running to the basement to power on the computer. Currently, I have the computer automatically shut itself off at 11PM via software and automatically turn on at 6AM (via BIOS) since I don't recording late night TV programs. TV listings are updated during the daytime. The hard drives are also powered off when the computer is not busy. Is there anything else I can do? I presume that if I turned on suspend or hibernate, the MVP would not be able to wake the computer up. Any suggestions? Thanks!

The spinning down of the hard drives will actually do more harm than good. Not only is more power used when spinning up, it is not good for the drives. When a computer is at idle it only draws as much power as needed, not what the power supply is rated at. Laptop drives use much less power, but have smaller capacity andare not built to handle the rigors of a lot of data being written. Many Mac mini users are finding this out as the drives are failing.

As for cutting down on the power draw, remove any unused cards or usb devices. Unplug the power to any drives you no longer use. Get a quality name brand power supply, cheap power supplies can use more energy to produce the required power than a quality power supply, try to find a power supply with a 120mm fan. Remove any unecessary case fans, a power supply with a 120mm fan and a copper CPU heatsink with an 80mm fan should be more than enough to circulate air in a PC case. Where ever possible replace fans on motherboard and graphics chips with properly rated heatsinks. Minimize the amount of RAM you need. Everything that plugs into the motherboard uses power, any USB device that does not have it's own power supply uses power, only connect what you need.

Monitors use the most power so make sure you shut it off when not inuse.

PC's really don't use as much power as most people think, if you are running SETI or constantly recording it definatley use more power but just sitting at idle a properly tuned PC isn't using that much.

[JoseC]

Another suggestion for conserving power is switch to using a mobile celeron in your desktop.

Karaktu over at anandtech.com has a rather detailed thread on how to deploy mobile celerons in a desktop environment. Also how to mod them & get 2.4 or in excess of 3 ghz out of some from a cpu that you can get on ebay or Anandtech for less than $40 when paired with a particular board. I was able to take a 1.8 to 2.4 myself by following his info.

Last time I spoke to Karaktu, he was attempting to build & configure a HTPC that consumed less energy than a 100 watt light bulb. I thought it was cool. If you are interested you can check his thread at...

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview....erthread=y

Anyway... hope you & others find this info useful.

[borgs5]

Obviously, if you have a monitor connected to your basement PC you should turn that off rather than leaving it in standby. People say that components can break early due to too much switching on and off but I must say that I have never really experienced that. I turn my monitor on and off maybe 10 times a day and its still working perfectly fine after many years.

You probably don't though but I thought I'd just check.

If you could find a way to remotely switch your PC into / out of standby that would save power when you are out of the house during the day. For remotely turning my PC on I use an external modem and just let it ring a couple of times before hanging up. I sometimes also use that technique when I'm actually in the house but in a different room using my mobile phone. Because my computer doesn't answer the call it costs nothing.

I wonder if a radio keyboard would have enough range to the basement?

[ww4397]

For remotely turning my PC on I use an external modem and just let it ring a couple of times before hanging up.

Very interesting, borgs5. I'd love to be able to turn my HTPC machine *on* without having to go downstairs all the time.

You mention coming out of *stand-by* with your technique. Would it work the same bringing a machine out of *hibernate*? Do you have a phone line dedicated to the PC? Would this work with an internal modem?

Thanks.

[borgs5]

From hibernate, I'm not sure - probably not though.

The form of standby I use is STR where it practically turns everything off except the RAM and things that I have told the BIOS to look out for - uses a few watts continuously but much less than if the machine was fully on.

No, I don't have a phone line dedicated to my PC. I have an external modem / answering machine attached to the serial port. It basically sends a signal through the serial port as soon as it rings. The BIOS has been configured to wake up the PC on modem ring. I didn't even need to install the modem driver in XP, it is actually disabled in XP but will still wake the PC up.

When I need to wake my PC from a remote location, or even from a room in the same house, I simply call my landline number using my mobile phone. I hang-up before the answering machine picks up. It does have the slight disadvantage that any phone calls to my house will turn the PC on. But, I have 1 or 2 at most per day and even then, my PC will go back into standby after a 5 minutes. I suppose if you did get a lot of calls then this technique could put a bit of strain on your hardware. I guess this might be why you asked if I had a second line? Don't see why an internal modem wouldn't work either - you'd have to experiment with BIOS settings to see. Just make a note of the old values first.

Basically, if I'm at work and need to schedule a TV recording, I phone home, let it ring twice and hang up. Wait a minute, by which time the PC has come out of standby, a program on the PC has identified the IP address from my broadband cable modem, checked if it is different from my last IP address and uploaded it to my home page if it is. I then use my work PC to connect to the GB-PVR web server on my home PC.

[homerjatmoes]

Very interesting, borgs5. I'd love to be able to turn my HTPC machine *on* without having to go downstairs all the time.

You mention coming out of *stand-by* with your technique. Would it work the same bringing a machine out of *hibernate*? Do you have a phone line dedicated to the PC? Would this work with an internal modem?

Thanks.

As long as your modem suports "wake on ring" it will work. If you have a laptop or network enabled PDA, you could also use wake on LAN to wake the PC. If you don't use the modem and it is in a slot, you could remove it and save energy. The average PCI cards draw 5 watts and even in standby they are powered.

You could get a remote power control with some simple X10 devices for around $30 just set your PC to boot on power mode. You would have to manually turn off the PC.

If you are really interested in what the computer is actually drawing get a clamp on ammeter and see what it is drawing to determine if you do need to make changes. Measure the draw at idle and at startup/shutdown and the time it stays at the current level. Measure the current used and length of time when it comes out of hibernate or standby. This is by far the only way you will be able to determine any kind of results.

If this is a home built or "beige box" pc I would seriously look at the quality of the power supply first it is the most oftn overlooked part in a PC and is usually the main source of a lot of performance issues and overall stability. If it is a name brand PC most aftermarket power supplies won't fit.

You should also take a look at the network tweaking thread on this forum, it goes into shutting down services that are not needed, services = cpu cycles = power used. Another thing to look at is a program called Cpuidle, it cuts down on the CPU power consumption

[ww4397]

Basically, if I'm at work and need to schedule a TV recording, I phone home, let it ring twice and hang up. Wait a minute, by which time the PC has come out of standby, a program on the PC has identified the IP address from my broadband cable modem, checked if it is different from my last IP address and uploaded it to my home page if it is. I then use my work PC to connect to the GB-PVR web server on my home PC.

Thanks for the reply.

I really like the idea of starting up the machine via phone. I'll tinker around a bit and look into STR vs. hibernate.

I know GBPVR will start the machine from hibernate when it is time to make a recording. Will it do the same from STR?

Now you've got me thinking some more with your remote (away from home) scheduling technique. What program do you use to do the IP check/update?

Thanks again.

[borgs5]

If you are really interested in what the computer is actually drawing get a clamp on ammeter and see what it is drawing to determine if you do need to make changes. Measure the draw at idle and at startup/shutdown and the time it stays at the current level. Measure the current used and length of time when it comes out of hibernate or standby. This is by far the only way you will be able to determine any kind of results.

Yep, I use a device like this one:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?Modu...&doy=25m10

It's a bit more convenient than the ammeter, it's probably not quite as accurate mind.

[borgs5]

Thanks for the reply.

I really like the idea of starting up the machine via phone. I'll tinker around a bit and look into STR vs. hibernate.

I know GBPVR will start the machine from hibernate when it is time to make a recording. Will it do the same from STR?

Now you've got me thinking some more with your remote (away from home) scheduling technique. What program do you use to do the IP check/update?

Thanks again.

Yep, see if you can get the machine to wake up from STR sleep first using modem ring or see if it works from hibernate - it might. Also check that there are no issues when your machine comes out of sleep. On two of my three machines I have issues when it comes out of sleep. On one, I have mouse pointer intermittent freezes every few seconds. On the other, the hard disk IDE port switches from Ultra ATA to the older, much slower, PIO standard. Luckily my EPIA seems to have no problems.

Regarding the IP checker update, I've written my own simple program in .NET. I'll see if I can find the source code as I haven't got a configuration file for it and my home page credentials are embedded in the exe.