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California To Adopt First US Energy-Saving Rules For Computers (reuters.com)
California regulators were poised on Wednesday to adopt the nation's first mandatory energy efficiency rules for computers and monitors -- devices that account for 3 percent of home electric bills and 7 percent of commercial power costs in the state. From a report on Reuters: The state Energy Commission said that when fully implemented, the plan will save consumers $373 million a year and conserve as much electricity annually as it takes to power all San Francisco's homes. Final approval of the standards, expected at a meeting in Sacramento of the five-member commission, caps a nearly two-year planning process that had input from environmentalists, industry, scientists and consumer groups. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), an environmental group that helped devise the standards, has said the new standards would cut greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion in power generation by 700,000 tons a year. The California standards set a benchmark for a machine's overall energy use and leave manufacturers the flexibility to choose which efficiency measures to use to meet it -- an approach that the NRDC says fosters innovation.
Like they do on TV. All off then.
So now not only do I have to leave the state to keep guns I've legally purchased, I have to leave to keep my fucking computer as well?
Does that mean California will ban the use of Java?
I once worked for a company that had mandated GPOs which turned machines off at a certain time each day. If you were working past 7:00, expect to deal with the power cycle. Of course, coming in and waiting for the machine to come up was a time waster as well. Ironic thing is that the "IT" department that did this learned really quickly to not toss the DCs and SQL server boxes into the OU that this policy applied to.
Basically, power-cycling hardware causes thermal expansion and contraction, which leads to earlier failure. Forcing people to power cycle instead of leaving it on will generate extra hardware sales.
A lot of data centers will move to another state.
California regulators were poised on Wednesday to adopt the nation's first mandatory energy efficiency rules for computers and monitors -- devices that account for 3 percent of home electric bills and 7 percent of commercial power costs in the state.
Does these figures include or exclude the extra cooling needs due to the computers and monitors?
If your computer burns 200W, if you live in the South, you likely spend an additional 300+W on cooling to offset that heat production.
And then sell a power supply as an easy add on component separately. Every computer wil be sold as a zero energy usage device, problem solved!
Maybe I somehow absolutely missed it, but looking at both the summary and TFA, I cannot figure out just WHAT the hell these new "standards" even are.
And really, with manufacturers shoving tablets that "act as laptops" which are meant to be desktop replacements and can be charged over USB cable, is evenergy efficiency of new computers even a concern at all anymore?
as much electricity annually as it takes to power all San Francisco's homes
So what you're saying is that we could avoid all of this if we just cut off all SF homes from the grid? Has anyone considered this option as an alternative? I never liked those people anyway. And they seem to be exactly the kind of people who are against the free market and are likely behind this. It would serve them right to have them do without electricity.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
A few articles have pointed out this paradox, including an episode of Freakonomics. It's been noted by various historians and economists that as efficiency improves, consumption tends to increase. This known as the Jevons Paradox.
The most famous example of this was 19th century locomotives. As engines became more efficient, it made the use of locomotives more economical and spurred an increase in the use of locomotives, leading to ever-higher consumption of coal.
In the 90s I had a "U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Pollution Preventer program for computers" compliant screen.
OK it wasn't a "rule" by then, but still, it existed.
Was Energy Star not mandatory?
All devices I've purchased have energy start compliance and saving features. Due to the annoyance of some features I have to disable them.
Like power saving brightness settings that adapt to the room lighting. Because I have to keep fucking with the brightness from what the TV perceives as light level in the room. E.G Window shining light into the room but not directly on the TV so it dims but overall room brightness is much higher.
Plus the time it took to get the right color and brightness / contrast I wanted. My computer is also high performance, and I used to notice significantly if a primary HDD powered down. It was a real pain. I have an SSD now and my storage drive I let spin down, but if they are nit picky on it, some content and programs cache significantly, which would let the HDD power down and it would drive me nuts getting lag spikes each time it spins up.
So I obviously adjust the power down time. I also notice the lag when the processor clocks down when it thinks it can, but it was wrong and clocks back up. I don't like stutter. If I'm playing a game it's a death. So I don't let my CPU clock down most of the time. Occasionally I adjust the power settings when I know I won't be doing anything intensive for days, and do shut my PC down when not in use.
But what else? Auto suspend? I mean that shit is annoying. It's been 20+ years and we still can't go to standby and back safely all the time depending on what programs are in use.
I will shit bricks if they expect me to pay the same amount for stuttering shitty low power / power saving hardware. They can fuck off I won't buy it.
California needs to cut all the energy usage they can to prepare for their succession from the union after Trump takes office. Since they have no power grid of their own, I assume that their massive energy needs will be provided by a bunch of dudes on bicycles. They're going to need to cut every watt they can.
FTFA:
The California standards set a benchmark for a machine's overall energy use and leave manufacturers the flexibility to choose which efficiency measures to use to meet it - an approach that the NRDC says fosters innovation.
Really. I mean, really? So basically I (pretend I'm a manufacturer) can build a computer that has a slow processor that throttles constantly, a SSD drive for long-term storage that will cost more but not grant much benefit given the throttling of resources, a machine that enters hibernation-mode sleep after 30 seconds of non-use, a GPU that can have an entire video uploaded to it and plays it on its own with no other system resource usage beyond basic interface, or a new type of display that has near-zero loss (dreaming now).
I'm just saying.. that's what it sounds like. There's no "innovation" to be had in computers anymore; at least not ones that will screw with the power factor more and more, basically using more fossil fuel to use less fossil fuel?
Speaking of which, there's an idea.. How about a direct non-switching power supply that doesn't screw with the AC line harmonics and stores, in capacitors, what it will need for fast surges of use?
Alternate idea: turn ANY devices or lighting/etc off when you're not using it. Apparently that's not possible for some reason, so we have to start nibbling at things that eat smaller amounts of power rather than the largest consumers of electricity - HVAC and other AC motor-driven devices...? This is a bit fishy. There has to be another reason behind the pushing of law to accomplish something, unless it's basically a way to force consumers to do what saves power already instead of giving them the option not to do it if they don't feel like it.
TFS & TFA are light on details, but here gives a little more info:
https://www.nrdc.org/experts/p...
The new proposed standards require that desktop computers reduce power draw by half when idle (with no user activity), and establishes more modest power reductions for notebooks/laptops, which already are much more efficient when operating on battery mode, but that is not always the case when they are plugged in.
mac pro will need to be cut down even more to fit into the new power rules or they class it as a server to have it listed as an 24/7 full power system.
...was already powered by Smug?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...!
Well, the innovative world of computing had a good run; now, the government has become aware of this sector of society, and won't stop until it's sufficiently crushed under foot.
I once worked for a company that had mandated GPOs which turned machines off at a certain time each day. If you were working past 7:00, expect to deal with the power cycle. Of course, coming in and waiting for the machine to come up was a time waster as well. Ironic thing is that the "IT" department that did this learned really quickly to not toss the DCs and SQL server boxes into the OU that this policy applied to.
I can see it now - stories popping up on /. about power companies in CA experiencing two period-tied brownouts in the morning hours because of all of the people turning computing devices on in their homes and workplaces. :)
Pretty much the story about many government agencies. When created they have very real and observable benefits. But once the initial issues are solved, they keep at it with bigger budgets and further reduced bang for the buck regulations then finally enough people get fed up and it gets jacked up. The EPA is a good example of this.
like TVs, DVRs, cable boxes and home appliances that have joined the IoTs movement
San Francisco is 2% of the states population. So to power them they would need to decrease power used by computers from 3% to 1% over the entire state. Meaning a 67% decrease. How inefficient are computers that that is doable? Considering that computers now means tablets, which have a huge reason to be as energy efficient as possible, I do not see this being all that doable.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
No I dont want my desktop to go to sleep ever. I certainly dont want a server doing that. No actual specifics to be found in anything this is just a fluff piece.
No sir I dont like it.
Will this save electricity, who knows? The whole save as much as SF is a over generalization that ignores all of the computing equipment that would not be up this new spec. What it will do is drive up costs as manufacturers re-engineer for a new spec that may only be required in CA.
And then sell a power supply as an easy add on component separately. Every computer wil be sold as a zero energy usage device, problem solved!
Too soon. That comes after three failures over a five year period of mandating and adjusting the allowable limits, throwing people into mass-hysteria. :)
At least my computer and monitor, out of the box, go to sleep after a while.
Please, , let them turn their attention to Cable and Satellite TV boxes that when turned "off" with the remote still pull 20+ watts. Let them turn their attention to items like the Roku 3, which didn't even have the concept of "off" (and which kept a moving logo on the screen permanently to keep your TV from turning off). Let them turn their attention to all the IOT thingies, for whom implementing low-power states is an even lower priority than providing basic security.
And the worms ate into his brain.
Here's a link to the CEC's news release. It contains a link to a more detailed report in PDF format.
http://www.energy.ca.gov/releases/2016_releases/2016-09-09_computer_standards_nr.html
I'm guessing they haven't made the proposed legislation available yet; I haven't been able to find it so far. It looks like they're dividing everything into different regulatory tiers (desktop/workstation/laptop/server etc), and measuring compliance based on that.
Thats the only consistent way to get around the law. Of course we could switch to monochrome Liquid Crystal Displays.
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
California is a one-party-rule banana republic - this past November the two senate candidates were BOTH DEMOCRATS, no Republican was allowed on the ballot for US Senate after the election rules were rigged.
When the left has that sort of power, they elevate all their fringe boutique causes over the welfare of the average citizen. In this case, they are eliminating nuclear and coal power plants, eliminating hydro electric power (dams are "evil" enemies of Gaia and her rivers and fish) and so we do not have enough power to go around. We have windmills and solar panels, but we need to leech power from other states at night and when the winds reduce. The solution of the Tom Steyer carnival freak show crowd is NOT to actually generate the power needed, but rather to ration the power we have and pretend we are doing something good with the words "efficiency" and "conservation". We're just not generating the power the people need, and we're re-arranging the deck chairs to prevent the public from seeing it - oh, and advancing recreational drug legalization so that young stupid voters stay stupid and delusional as they age and vote for the left-wing machine.
First faggot
This is especially funny since California has long been known for Silicon Valley, the innovation center for the fastest and most powerful new computing technology. (Well, at least until China took the crown.) Now they'll be known for keeping their computers turned off, and running at throttled speeds when they are on. Software developers will have their beefy i7's replaced with anemic Atoms. Go California!! (just don't go too fast...)
It should be noted the regulation is going to effectively ban open source operating systems in California.
The regulation requires a certification that includes testing of the OS's power management capabilities, which means only OS's with a big enough corporate backer to get them through the certification process are going to be legal.
Its sounds like most PC manufacturers are planning on meeting these new "idle energy use" requirements by forcing the use of connected standby/S0ix. Which mean no traditional ACPI S3 "put my computer to sleep" feature. It also means mandatory secure boot for all systems. Most Linux distros are incapable of supporting S0ix with Runtime D3 due to the mandatory use of newer Win8.1+ ASL methods that are not very well defined in the ACPI standard. This regulation is pretty bad for anyone that likes to build their PC from scratch or run Linux. It will be used as an excuse to force Win10 upgrades.
So long as the place (eg, California) shimmers brightly at night...
These energy saver 'micro-aggressions' against high technology devices and those who use them are transparently revealed for what they are,
1. Marketing of 'new' tech to replace embarrassingly reliable old tech
2. Under guise of carbon regulation, getting Government to enforce mandate same
3. Tiny little carbon-saver lollipops for guilty faux environmentalists to suck on
4. Promoting power up/down cycles to reduce lifespan from thermal variation and surge
Coming in low for a landing late at night over a sprawling metropolis once (I think it was Chicago), countless completely empty parking lots blazing from horizon to horizon... I'm musing, "Have they actually compared the cost of all this energy against the cost of the crime it is supposed to prevent?"
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
I want the state government to keep their fucking hands off my fucking laptop. For years I have purchased most of my electronics devices online because I highly resent the $4-30 "disposal fee (aka hidden tax)" that the state started tacking onto all purchases of certain electronics items, new or used.