Apple and Intel weren't kidding about "low power"
Tom
Yager over at InfoWorld has performed some power tests on
a 20" Dual Core iMac to discover that these machines in fact do not meet Apple's bold low-power specs -
they surpass them. Apple lists the maximum power consumption of a 20" Dual Core iMac at 120 watts, while Tom's tests - even with both 2.0 GHz cores maxed at 100% CPU usage, 1 GB RAM, WiFi, BT, 128 MB graphics card and (oh yea) a 20" LCD - found the iMac drawing a steady 95 watts of power. Assuming that the typical LCD draws around 32 watts of power alone, that means the iMac - even at full throttle - is running as 63 watt personal computer. By comparison, Intel's old Pentium 4 architecture that still ships in many computers needs anywhere from 300-400 watt power supplies - and that's just for the computer itself, sans-display. I should know, I used to build them for a living.
Ultimately, this should boil down to great news for the computing industry. Tom Yager's even so excited about the results that he's issued a friendly challenge to the PC market to find a machine that can claim the same stats. The one question that still bothers me about these new chips, however: why hasn't Apple placed at least an estimated battery life rating on the MacBook Pro?
[via MacSlash]
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
bob said 1:19PM on 2-21-2006
why haven't they included battery life estimates? because o'grady clocked them to be 2 hours 30 minutes before the involuntary shutdown. i disagree with some of his settings, but we'll see
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DerekJ said 1:30PM on 2-21-2006
Wowie zowie, that's many times over less than my old eMac...wow!
That's gonna save me a significant percentage on my monthly electricity bill.
sad but true.
I wonder what the drain would be for my minimumed out iMac core duo...
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Joshua Ochs said 1:31PM on 2-21-2006
Does this include initial startup? There is a significant power draw on initial boot to spin up the hard drives; thus the larger power supplies in tower cases where there may be multiple drives to spin up simultaneously.
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Andrew Dunlop said 1:39PM on 2-21-2006
Has Apple got a lot greener of late?
Their packaging has got less wasteful and computers more power efficant.
This is good news for the enviornment, our pockets and (if Apple milk it) Apple's image.
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PhonyJoe said 1:50PM on 2-21-2006
What about the optical drive?
The DVD drive is what really drains the battery on a laptop. And like Joshua mentioned the hard drives draw a fair amount on their own.
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Dinesh babu said 2:15PM on 2-21-2006
iMac runs like a Zen. It is really calm. My iMac (1.83Ghz and 512 MB RAM) last evening was converting an iMovie to high quality MOV file, mpeg streamclip was converting an MPEG to 10Gig of DV file and I had trashed some 10GIG of iMovie project and emptying it + iTunes + safari + some tiny other stuff. Response from iMac - Silence, No sound of the fan, only a faint hard disk accessing noise once a while! My Windows PC would have puffed puffed .. when I tried even one of those video related stuff !
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bryan ribas said 2:16PM on 2-21-2006
I agree with #4 (Andrew). Apple seems to be a company that would help the enviorment. And that is a + in my mind.
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Chris Dolan said 2:21PM on 2-21-2006
Many are noting the difference between the max of 120 and the actual of 95. Note that the machine must also be able to provide power via FW/USB/DVI to external hard drives, scanners, iPods, speakers, external monitors, etc. I'm sure that overhead of 25 watts was carefully chosen. I do not believe this is a case of Apple exceeding any specs.
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Christopher said 3:05PM on 2-21-2006
Very impressive, it's like a laptop on a stick! ;-)
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fra said 5:51PM on 2-21-2006
Think about the print advert:
'Did you know the new iMac uses less power than a standard light bulb, Another reason not to care about windows'
SEE THE PUN, THE OS AND THE GLA... nevemind...
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Oliver Keller said 7:22PM on 2-21-2006
Pentium 4 with 300-400 Watt power consumption? Not really... if this would be just due to the proccesor, that'd be a heater at best! The nominal maximum value of a AT(X) computer power supply is usually far from the actual value the system draws.
@TUAW makers: please be fair and don't overdo it.
For the records: my Powermac G3 300Mhz draws as much as my AMD XP1600 machine, ca. 65 Watts (after booting). Get a power meter from the DIY store and gain some insight. They aren't expensive these days...
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Don said 8:54PM on 2-21-2006
The Quad 2.5 G5 has a 1.0 KW power supply!
Can't wait for low performance per watt powermacs
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Nick said 10:01PM on 2-21-2006
#11: Are you seriously trying to compare an iMac with a Core Duo to an Athlon XP and a G3 300?
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sans nomen said 4:28AM on 2-22-2006
What is going on? Is everyone in the office using "sans" as if it is a viable word in everyday language? Do you know how obtuse it makes you sound? You would be better off sans it. I say that sans the word "sans" the world would be a better place. In fact, sans "sans" this post would be sans meaning. Get my drift or are you sans any clue to where I am going? Oh how Latin makes those sans a thing to say sound like they have something to say. But I can hear that you can't just use sans where "without" would normally be, but are they sans sense.
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cubeXpert said 5:10AM on 2-22-2006
The power supply must be able to provide power to peripheral equipment via USB and FireWire. That's accounts for some of the headroom up to 120W. Apple has probably factored in future speedbumps in this estimate also...
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alex said 8:07AM on 2-22-2006
without nomen: i can't remember a time i didn't know of the word sans... oh. and its french, not nearly so pompous.
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