Tom's Hardware > Forum > CPU & Components > CPUs > Anyone know if the CPU consumption (Watt) is changing ?

Anyone know if the CPU consumption (Watt) is changing ?

Forum CPU & Components : CPUs - Anyone know if the CPU consumption (Watt) is changing ?

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If i have CPU X of company Y and its consume by Watt is 95W , does the consumption in Watt changing throw the process or it allways consume 95W?

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It consumes 95W at 100% CPU utilization. Idle power is much lower.

Reply to GhislainG

Are you talking about the TDP or the actual power draw?

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Reply to Shadow703793
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95w=95w the cpu will use max 95w when all its components are pushed to their limits at stock clock

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Reply to xaira

Shadow703793 wrote :

Are you talking about the TDP or the actual power draw?


^This. TDP is not power consumption.

Reply to randomizer

GhislainG wrote :

It consumes 95W at 100% CPU utilization. Idle power is much lower.


How much lower?

Reply to bonzaiholding

randomizer wrote :

^This. TDP is not power consumption.



TDP is thermal design power or something like that.

It is a worst case scenario of how much a CPU can produce.

Reply to amdfangirl

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_Design_Power

 

http://www.silentpcreview.com/article169-page3.html

 

"What this means is that Intel’s TDP is actually lower than the maximum power dissipation of the processor (and as you’ll see later, it can be significantly lower). This is in stark contrast to AMD’s TDP numbers, which are higher than the respective processor’s maximum power dissipation. "


Message edited by Outlander_04 on 08-24-2009 at 12:53:29 PM
Reply to Outlander_04

bonzaiholding wrote :

How much lower?



I think you need to take a look at reviews of processors. Each generation of processor from any company does differ in their power consumption when idle. An example would be an i7 vs a C2Q, an i7 may consume higher when at load, but it is also consumes lower power when idle.

Reply to amnotanoobie

also bare in mind performance your pulling from that power consumed/emitted etc

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Reply to apache_lives

It seems to me that most of the power a CPU draws is converted into heat. I'm just a layman but I would guess that >90% of the power drawn is converted into heat (based on reading stuff like this: http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo/ [...] tstart=3).

So I'd argue the main reason TDP =/= a CPU's maximum power consumption is that the TDP doesn't measure the theoretically maximum power dissipation of a CPU. Specifically, when TDP is calculated, (i) spikes of power dissipation so short that they are irrelevant for cooling system design are ignored; (ii) code is employed which requires <100% CPU utilization (simply because it's so difficult to generate machine code that makes use of all available units of the CPU at the same time).

So my point is: to the extent TDP accurately measures a CPU's true maximum power dissipation, it's probably a pretty good measure of a CPU's maximum power draw. But OP, keep in mind that the CPU will dissipate a lot less heat than specified by the TDP under "normal usage." Under normal usage, the CPU often has so little work to do that it reduces its clock rate or turns off some of its units (or both).

EDIT: thinking of Intel CPUs here...


Message edited by jasperjones on 08-25-2009 at 01:34:25 AM
Reply to jasperjones
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bonzaiholding wrote :

How much lower?


A lot lower. Most cpus get down to 10W or less at a full idle state.

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Reply to cjl

Thanks for all of your answers.

Reply to bonzaiholding
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