Fujitsu To Show Off "Zero-Watt" PC At CeBIT

mobile writes "In August of last year Fujitsu announced new 'zero-watt' displays. This means the screens use absolutely no power when put into standby mode, unlike most other screens that use less than 1 watt, but still require some power. Now Fujitsu has announced they will be showing a zero-watt PC later this year at the CeBIT show. The PC is called the Esprimo Green and marks a first, in that it's able to use no power while in standby mode — but this is a feature that will be required from 2010 for new PCs released across Europe."

Comments

Very nice.

[idontgno]

I've been looking for a computer powered by zero-point energy drawn from vacuum fluctuation.

Maybe I can transplant the power supply into my car and get infinite miles per gallon?

ZOMG

[roman_mir]

That's AMAZING NEW TECH!!! Zero watts, ha? I can't believe we finally figured this shit out!

Just unplug the damned things, people!

[pla]

This means the screens use absolutely no power when put into standby mode, unlike most other screens that use less than 1 watt, but still require some power

I don't get this obsession with "standby" power draw... My computer and display and TV and DVD player already draw zero watts when off, thanks to the magic of the switch on the power strip.

And for the record, I don't even do this for the power savings - More than once, I've had my "expensive" electronic toys saved from nearby lightning strikes that took out things like alarm clocks and answering machines (No, a power strip won't stop a direct hit, but they do wonders to stop spikes up to a few hundred volts).

Re:Define "Standby"

[RollingThunder]

No the summary says they introduced zero watt displays LAST YEAR. The new thing that's going to be introduced is a zero-watt PC.

Re:Define "Standby"

[markov_chain]

The zero-power use state is activated when the "zero-power" LED turns on.

Re:Define "Standby"

[duguk]

they never turn off their computers

I have a Seagate drive and scared that if I reboot, I'll lose all my data, you insensitive clod!

Yep, a shell game

[russotto]

Even though the Esprimo Green uses no power in standby mode Fujitsu say it can still be managed with LAN, Bluetooth, and UMTS. A demonstration of which will surely be given during CeBIT.

To do that

1) They've managed to break the laws of physics or
2) They're lying or
3) They're storing power

And of course, if it's 3, that stored power has to be replenished when the computer is on, causing slightly higher draw then. It's certainly possible that the efficiency of doing that is greater than the efficiency of drawing a very small current from the line. But calling it "zero power" is just marketing. Truly "using zero power" would mean that any internal state of charge wouldn't be depleted either.

Re:Yep, a shell game

[afidel]

Interesting idea, combine PoE and WoL. You send the magic packet, the switchport intercepts it and provides power to that port then the NIC uses the PoE power to switch a relay in the PSU. Would be very efficient and still allow the computers to be managed for patching. It wouldn't add much in the consumer space but I see it as a future direction for large enterprise deployments. Oh and if anyone tries to patent it, prior art =)

Re:Define "Standby"

[morgan_greywolf]

Hmmmm...that's weird. I have a Seagate hard drive and I've never lost d

Bloody greenwashing

[EmbeddedJanitor]

This sort of saving it getting to be pretty typical of a lot of "green marketing". Make a big deal out of the very tiny savings and ignore the big stuff. Save the 1W or so, but ignore the fact that the computer as a whole uses a lot of power.

The problem with just fixing and selling the small stuff is that this can actually be counter-productive. "Green guilt" has a positive purpose: make people feel bad so they do less of that bad thing. The "eco products" counter that: buy our xxx and you don't have to feel bad. This would be OK except that people often then modify their behavior. Someone that feels bad for driving 5 miles with an SUV might feel they're doing the planet good when they drive 100 miles with a Prius.

Same deal here. I don't feel bad about leaving my computer on any more because the monitor is now using zero Watts.

Re:Bloody greenwashing

[wish bot]

I sort of agree with you, but this has a purpose.

When people put their equipment to sleep, they expect it to be effectively 'off'. The problem has been that most devices draw a TON of power when in standby - this something that certainly needs addressing (and there's no real good reason for it other than sheer engineering laziness).

Now, worrying about zero-power standby on your 300MW super-sized plasma might be hypocritical, but the EU (and other governments) have established targets for these sorts of things too. I'd have to say that considering every aspect of electronics with regards to efficiency is a good thing.

Re:Define "Standby"

[damn_registrars]

My computer doubles as the music streamer I listen to at work. It also doubles as the router my family uses to access the internet. It also doubles as a file server.

So it quadruples?

He doubled three times, there. 2*2*2 = 8. I'm afraid it actually octuples.

Re:Well I understand reducing it

[Creepy Crawler]

---Worrying over a device drawing milliwatts is silly.

Is it now?

Have you ever heard of QRP? It's a code for power reduction in terms of ham radio. When we're talking QRP, we're talking about 1w or LESS power to communicate anywhere in the world. In the early spring, we can communicate with Midway (the island), and we're in Indiana. We've done satellite communications on .5w, however that was using a parabolic antenna.

So yes, 1w is a lot of power.

Re:Define "Standby"

[TwistedSymmetry]

I'm tired of this gag. It doesn't even make sen

Re:Define "Standby"

[CecilPL]

How come we can get modded Funny just by having a Seagate drive?

Re:Define "Standby"

[aetherworld]

You must be new h

As another poster to you noted

[Sycraft-fu]

My point is not what can you do with a watt, my point is that a watt is a trivial amount of power compared to what our devices use. The monitor I'm looking at right now while typing this is drawing about 60 watts, and it's an LCD. My air conditioner draws around 3500 watts when active. My car can produce nearly 130,000 watts when run to it's full capacity.

So suppose you have a device that draws 1 watt idle. Most draw less, but suppose. Ok that means you can run that for 60 hours before equaling just one hour of my monitor usage. You can run it for half a year before equaling just one hour of my AC. The car, well I can't do an accurate comparison since it doesn't run at full power, but I'm betting you can run an idle device for over a year for the same amount of energy as a short trip.

So, my point is that worrying about that shit is stupid. That isn't where the majority of our energy usage is happening. Saying "Oh we reduced this to zero," sounds nice until you realize that in a single day an AC will use more than that thing will over a lifetime of idle.

I mean take my monitor as an example. As I said, I measure the power draw of it on to be about 60 watts. When it's idle, as in I've pressed the "soft off" switch, it doesn't read a power draw. My meter has a resolution of 1 watt so I don't know what the draw is. Somewhere less than a watt. We'll call it half a watt for argument's sake. I suspect it's actually less, but whatever.

Now I've owned the monitor for about a year, and in that time it's been on for 2090 hours (it's a professional monitor, keeps that in it's firmware). So during it's life it has used about 125kWh. Assuming that it is in soft off mode the rest of the time (I actually shut down my UPS) it would have spent about 6,670 hours idle. That would equal a usage of about 3kWh, maybe less.

So, what's the real thing to solve here in terms of less energy usage? Worrying about making it "zero power" when off (which I can do if I like, either with the monitor's hard off switch of the UPS) or reducing the power used when on by just 5%? Well 5% of 125kWh is 6kWh so over twice the draw as reducing the idle mode. It's also a lot more realistic. An LED backlight would probably get that 5%, maybe more.

That's what I mean. It is worrying about shit that just doesn't matter much. Even if you are just worried about the electronics, the power draw is in their on mode. An hour of on will equal days of idle. However all that pales in comparison to many other devices.

So sure, I see the point in saying "Keep your soft off draw as low as practical." Seems like modern devices do that already. However this "It must be zero watts," is stupid. I reiterate: 1 watt is NOT a lot of energy.