[Gllug] Power supply problems - question...

[itsbruce at uklinux.net]

On Fri, Oct 10, 2003 at 12:22:23PM +0100, Peter Ball wrote:
> On 10 Oct 2003 at 10:24, Darren wrote:
> 
> > First post, so hello folks! :-)
> > 
> > Regarding power supplies...I'm wanting to build a
> > low-power-consumption mini-itx box, just running Debian base.
> > 
> > Standard power supplies are a lot cheaper than the specialised 65 or
> > 100 watt ones and I just want to confirm what I think I remember from
> > GCSE Physics ;-) "Conservation of Energy" - If I use a 350w power
> > supply to power this setup, it'll only consume whatever power the
> > connected equipment draws (excluding losses through heat generated
> > etc).
> > 
> > Does this sound reasonable?
> 
> Not necessarily so.
> 
> It depends on the efficiency of the power supply which is likely to worse (probably much 
> worse) when you are using only a small percentage of the capacity of the power supply.  
> Also the cheaper supplies have fans which are always at full speed even when that is 
> not needed.

It is possible to build fanless mini-itx boxes that can be run from the
kind of power adapters that power many consumer devices.  That would
avoid all this but you do have to accept that you won't be using the
fastest, highest performing chips etc.

-- 
Bruce

-- 
Gllug mailing list  -  Gllug at linux.co.uk
http://list.ftech.net/mailman/listinfo/gllug