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Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
11–20 of 174 posts
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#12> Precise estimates vary, but currently about 5 percent of all energy consumption in the U.S. goes just to running computers
30% goes on transport.
> the human brain is a computer. This particular computer uses some 10–20 percent of all the calories that a human consumes
So society's computer uses 5 percent and our own, evolved over millions of years, uses up to 20.
I'm not saying computers can't or shouldn't be made more efficient, but relatively speaking, the title of this article is pretty bizarre. Computers don't use very much energy compared to almost everything else in the world.
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#13This is pretty cool from a low powered 144 computer chip.
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#14What i don't understand is how a phone can be so powerful with so little watt usage. especially compared to a PC
A phone, while powerful, is still nowhere near a modern PC in terms of performance. As you push for more and more performance, you’ll pay increasingly more, both in power and money, for increasingly smaller gains.
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#15> Precise estimates vary, but currently about 5 percent of all energy consumption in the U.S. goes just to running computers 30% goes on transport. > the human brain is a computer. This particular computer uses some 10–20 percent of all the calories that a human consumes So society's computer uses 5 percent and our own, evolved over millions of years, uses up to 20. I'm not saying computers can't or shouldn't be made…
Maybe we could also say that our civilization is energetically compute equivalent to human level intelligence when we are using 20% of our energy on computers? Alternatively, if the human brain is orders-of-magnitude more efficient than a computer (as argued in the article), then a “civilizational human-level intelligence” is, likewise, orders-of-magnitude ‘away’?
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#16What i don't understand is how a phone can be so powerful with so little watt usage. especially compared to a PC
There are a lot of efficient PC's available. My HTPC sleeps when not playing and when streaming 1080p/4k videos only uses about 25 watts... which isn't bad considering its streaming from a NAS with plex through to an Xbox One. Phones, on the other hand, are highly specialized - PC's are general purpose. Trade off is often power requirements and performance. My 8 core 16 thread Ryzen Gaming PC smokes anything my phone…
I agree with your point, but I run a cluster of 6 ODroid systems (running an Emby server (which only runs on one of the nodes)) , and even then it peaks at around 50 watts last time I measured (the hard drive array is separate and peaks at around 30).
I haven't done a ton of side-by-side comparisons, but it does feel like ARM runs more efficiently per watt.
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#17> Precise estimates vary, but currently about 5 percent of all energy consumption in the U.S. goes just to running computers 30% goes on transport. > the human brain is a computer. This particular computer uses some 10–20 percent of all the calories that a human consumes So society's computer uses 5 percent and our own, evolved over millions of years, uses up to 20. I'm not saying computers can't or shouldn't be made…
The article goes on to explain just how wasteful our computers are, compared to the computations that go on in cells (which is a staggeringly large amount of computation, given their speed and abundance).
> But the thermodynamic efficiency of this computation—the amount of energy required by a ribosome per elementary operation—is many orders of magnitude superior to the thermodynamic efficiency of our current artificial computers.
So I think the headline is justifiable in light of this comparison.
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are a lot of efficient PC's available. My HTPC sleeps when not playing and when streaming 1080p/4k videos only uses about 25 watts... which isn't bad considering its streaming from a NAS with plex through to an Xbox One. Phones, on the other hand, are highly specialized - PC's are general purpose. Trade off is often power requirements and performance. My 8 core 16 thread Ryzen Gaming PC smokes anything my phone…
I agree with your point, but I run a cluster of 6 ODroid systems (running an Emby server (which only runs on one of the nodes)) , and even then it peaks at around 50 watts last time I measured (the hard drive array is separate and peaks at around 30). I haven't done a ton of side-by-side comparisons, but it does feel like ARM runs more efficiently per watt.
It is definitely the case that pushing raw performance erodes perf / watt on a given process and architecture. You could slightly underclock and moderately undervolt many CPUs or GPUs to see a fairly significant gain in perf / watt.
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#19> Precise estimates vary, but currently about 5 percent of all energy consumption in the U.S. goes just to running computers 30% goes on transport. > the human brain is a computer. This particular computer uses some 10–20 percent of all the calories that a human consumes So society's computer uses 5 percent and our own, evolved over millions of years, uses up to 20. I'm not saying computers can't or shouldn't be made…
The article goes on to explain just how wasteful our computers are, compared to the computations that go on in cells (which is a staggeringly large amount of computation, given their speed and abundance). > But the thermodynamic efficiency of this computation—the amount of energy required by a ribosome per elementary operation—is many orders of magnitude superior to the thermodynamic efficiency of our current artific…
Don't get me wrong, I'm well aware of how inefficient computers actually are compared to cells. But I just don't really see the relevance of the comparison.
Computers are so much more efficient that so many things in our world that we could much more easily improve the efficiency of: it would be great to make artificial computers as efficient as our brains but sinking resources into the effort rather than addressing much more pressing low-hanging fruit isn't really logically sound.
Of course it's not a zero-sum game: we can sink resources into both, but the alarmist headline is still hyperbole for this reason.
Re: Why Do Computers Use So Much Energy?
#20> Precise estimates vary, but currently about 5 percent of all energy consumption in the U.S. goes just to running computers 30% goes on transport. > the human brain is a computer. This particular computer uses some 10–20 percent of all the calories that a human consumes So society's computer uses 5 percent and our own, evolved over millions of years, uses up to 20. I'm not saying computers can't or shouldn't be made…
You could probably cut that consumption in half if people stopped using interpreted languages in production, quit telling curious young programmers that early optimization is evil or that memory is an implementation detail, etc. etc.
The computer is very efficient, electrical engineers toil and sweat a great deal to make them so. Then we build things with Ruby and Python and make things 2 orders of magnitude less efficient for, I think, no good reason. What makes those languages pleasant to use is not strictly tied to them being interpreted.