Building a Green PC 190
Kermit writes "Ars Technica has put together a green DIY system building guide. The idea is to build a PC offering decent energy efficiency as well as solid performance. The 'Green Gaming Box' draws about 125W at full load (not including a monitor); the minimalist 'Extreme Green Box' uses a mini-ITX case and a VIA CPU-motherboard combo for about 30W at typical load. If you want to mix and match components, or modify your current system so that it uses less energy, there are plenty of options for swapping out individual components."
Wattage is the new penis size (Score:3, Informative)
I have to believe some huge corporation will catch on to this and _demand_ 80Plus for their next thousands of machines and in 10 years we'll be amazed that computers were sold without efficient power supplies.
Re:"Green Computing" (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Green Software + Hardware (Score:3, Informative)
Having one big DC supply with lots of outlets in your home is likely to be less energy efficient (because of the large voltage loss over long cable runs at high currents) than having local ones.
That's not to say that having one SMPS per PC, with DC outlets on the back of the PC for monitor, printer etc wouldn't be a good idea - in fact I'd have thought that would be an excellent idea. (As would having DC outlets on the back of your TV for the DVD, TiVo, XBox etc).
The problem might be that there's a patent on this (http://www.freepatentsonline.com/5768600.html)
Re:I don't have a green PC (Score:4, Informative)
Of course it does. That's why you need to read the spreadsheet instead of just the link. They're not calculating CO2 but CO2 equivalents. Basically the motorcycles that they measured don't have catalytic converters so they put out more CO HC and NOx. These are then converted to something called "global warming potential" by multiplying them by 3, 12 and 296 respectively. Oh, and I can't get at the original article. But I can get at the second link in the spreadsheet and guess what... the number 296 is for N2O not for NOx. NOx is thought to be greenhouse neutral so the number should be zero. Plug that into the sheet et voilà. Bikes are 10% cleaner than cars. Never ever believe global warming believers at their word.