im building a new machine for myself, but strangely, am concerned about power efficiency versus electrical costs. it's weird, i know. for example, one of my problems is deciding on a cpu, of which i had had my mind on the phenom 2 x4 965be. its only $160 or so. but then i see it runs at 125w while some lower phenom x4's can run at just 95w. to me, the price of the 965 is well worth it for its speed, but since it runs at 20 watts higher, what are the extra costs (in electricity bill) after a years worth of usage? $20-$200 over a 95w? ballpark? what about after several years? suddenly, it's not just a $60 flat difference between the cpu's.
this also got me thinking about other components, like motherboard and ram power consumption. of course lower consumption is better, and a lot of component reviews do state how many watts a device uses. i would just like to know an average figure of what a person is saving in comparable wattage differences. this would help me decide what is most cost effective to buy, in regards to how much power/speed i actually need.
if anyone knows about this kind of stuff please drop your opinion / advice. or if you got a link that goes into detail about it id appreciate it.
this also got me thinking about other components, like motherboard and ram power consumption. of course lower consumption is better, and a lot of component reviews do state how many watts a device uses. i would just like to know an average figure of what a person is saving in comparable wattage differences. this would help me decide what is most cost effective to buy, in regards to how much power/speed i actually need.
if anyone knows about this kind of stuff please drop your opinion / advice. or if you got a link that goes into detail about it id appreciate it.