I don't know it this has been ever suggested. More greener VDR.
What I have in my mind is to shutdown DVB cards when not needed. Why?
I use my VDR as fileserver and web platform so I am not happy to shutdown whole machine (I run 24/7). I turn off harddrives to save energy, OS and X is on SSD drive. So it comes into question that if not timers are occouring and I indicate with power off-button (or even main menu-entry "power save") that I am not live tv -using VDR, and EPGScan is not needed, why not shutdown the DVB cards? EPGScan could be done with budget card on timeout, naturally if budget is present. After scan go to sleep again. With hitting remote could wake up the cards (I am not using DVB card IR remote) which needed. Like FF card for menu, or with softdevices, enable tv-out via that.
I don't know how much watt savings could be achieved with this, but on conseptual level it sounds good or do you agree?
I hope some 10-20 watts could be saved in 1xFF and 2xbudget environment. And less heat inside the box, on softdevices CPU runs lower power etc..
//Jori
On Saturday 06 September 2008, jori.hamalainen@teliasonera.com wrote:
I've taken measurements of power consumption on my vdr boxes. Both have had a single DVB-T budget card and playback is via the VOMP plugin.
The present machine is a 2.3 GHz Athlon X2 64-bit. It idles at 42w, starting and stopping vdr has no measurable effect so I leave it running.
The previous one used a 32-bit Athlon mobile CPU in a desktop motherboard. That machine idled at 62w (less efficient power supply and higher-spec graphics card). With vdr running the CPU temperature increased by 1 degree C and power consumption increased about 1 watt.
It would be possible to save a few more watts if the DVB card could be completely powered off (my new machine needs only 38w without the card installed) but AFAIK that's not possible for PCI. A better bet for a 'green' vdr is careful choice of components.
The main advantage to putting the "power off" button to use is to tell vdr you are not watching tv, so if it's also not recording, it's free to tune to a TP with guide data or update channel list, etc..
----- Original Message ----- From: "Dave P" vdr@pickles.me.uk To: "VDR Mailing List" vdr@linuxtv.org Sent: Saturday, September 06, 2008 3:40 AM Subject: Re: [vdr] Greener VDR
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Dave P -
jori.hamalainen＠teliasonera.com -
Timothy D. Lenz