Idle Power Consumption
Note
The peaks in these tables don’t always occur at the same time. This means that the total peak power consumption isn’t always the sum of the peaks on the individual rails, since maximums can happen at different times.
Power consumption on the Windows desktop isn’t particularly interesting. However, it’s an important measurement for anyone who doesn’t spend all of their time rendering and encoding (most of us). Since none of these cards are actually new, it’s interesting to see how efficient MSI’s board design really is. ZeroCore Power isn’t really the object of these measurements, but it does work.
MSI R9 390X Gaming 8G
Let’s start with the highest-end card. An average of 14W for the entire measurement duration is a bit under that of AMD’s reference board, which can be explained by MSI’s fan turning itself off.
| Header Cell - Column 0 | Minimum | Maximum | Average |
|---|---|---|---|
| PCI-E Total: | 0.00 W | 40.32 W | 11.68 W |
| Mainboard 3.3V: | 0.66 W | 1.98 W | 1.24 W |
| Mainboard 12V: | 0.00 W | 7.56 W | 1.50 W |
| VGA Card Total: | 0.66 W | 41.97 W | 14.41 W |
MSI R9 380 Gaming 2G
The mid-level graphics card comes in at just under 13W, which is just a bit less than its larger sibling. Understandably, it behaves in a very similar manner.
| Header Cell - Column 0 | Minimum | Maximum | Average |
|---|---|---|---|
| PCI-E Total: | 0.00 W | 24.40 W | 10.14 W |
| Mainboard 3.3V: | 0.00 W | 1.32 W | 0.32 W |
| Mainboard 12V: | 0.00 W | 9.76 W | 2.27 W |
| VGA Card Total: | 0.00 W | 32.05 W | 12.73 W |
MSI R7 370 Gaming 2G
The smallest model is a lot more miserly when it comes to power consumption at idle. Its 8W reading is a great result.
| Header Cell - Column 0 | Minimum | Maximum | Average |
|---|---|---|---|
| PCI-E Total: | 0.00 W | 15.60 W | 3.95 W |
| Mainboard 3.3V: | 0.99 W | 2.64 W | 1.90 W |
| Mainboard 12V: | 0.00 W | 10.08 W | 2.30 W |
| VGA Card Total: | 1.32 W | 24.99 W | 8.16 W |
