MBA Watt Usage

[tech324]

Has anyone ever hooked up their 11 or 13 inch MBA to a kill-a-watt meter to see how much power it draws on idle and full CPU usage? If someone could post their usage for idle and full CPU usage I would appreciate it.

 

[42streetsdown]

1.21 gigawatts

This would be interesting to know.

 

[simsaladimbamba]

You can use iStat Menus (trial) to monitor your power use.

 

[Bottomsup]

Has anyone ever hooked up their 11 or 13 inch MBA to a kill-a-watt meter to see how much power it draws on idle and full CPU usage? If someone could post their usage for idle and full CPU usage I would appreciate it.

Yes I have.

I have an 11" ultimate. Fully charged with normal usage i noticed it taking ~25 watts to operate. I was doing office productivity work so i didn't test full CPU load vs completely idle, etc..

Charting is starts slow, ramps to ~35w, then back down as it reaches full capacity.

hope this helps

 

[em500]

You can find both in these reviews:

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Apple-MacBook-Air-11-Inch-2010-Subnotebook.41497.0.html

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Apple-MacBook-Air-13-Inch-2010-Subnotebook.40961.0.html

Scroll down to "Current consumption", near the bottom (just above "Verdict").


The different power consumption are explained here: http://www.notebookcheck.net/?id=15394 near the bottom of the page.

 

[tech324]

Yes I have.

I have an 11" ultimate. Fully charged with normal usage i noticed it taking ~25 watts to operate. I was doing office productivity work so i didn't test full CPU load vs completely idle, etc..

Charting is starts slow, ramps to ~35w, then back down as it reaches full capacity.

hope this helps

Thanks for the numbers. Wow that seems kind of high. I wasn't expecting the 11 inch to run use up to 35 watts. I wonder if the new MBAs will use less.

 

[alust2013]

Thanks for the numbers. Wow that seems kind of high. I wasn't expecting the 11 inch to run use up to 35 watts. I wonder if the new MBAs will use less.

It should probably be similar. The 35W is because it will actually exceed the TDP at higher loads, the TDP is just kind of an average of sorts.

 

[Bottomsup]

It should probably be similar. The 35W is because it will actually exceed the TDP at higher loads, the TDP is just kind of an average of sorts.

I should mention that the 35w was measured while the machine was shutdown and charging from an empty battery. It never uses near that much will powered up.

 

[alust2013]

I should mention that the 35w was measured while the machine was shutdown and charging from an empty battery. It never uses near that much will powered up.

Ah, gotcha. That makes more sense, charging will do that.