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Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years

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Re: Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years

#2

Post by byoung2 »

He might have saved even more electricity had he gotten a laptop with the same specs as the mini. My Dell Inspiron 1525 has a 65W power supply, vs the similarly-equipped Mac Mini's 110W, and that 65W includes the screen. Adding an LCD to the Mac Mini adds another 30-50W.

Re: Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years

#4

Post by icey »

Where do you live? If it's somewhere warm I'd say not having fans might be part of your cost savings.

It would be much more compelling if you were giving us an apples-to-apples comparison with regards to the dates. My electricity bills in the winter are 1/6th what they are in the summer (although that's due to air conditioning).

[Edit: whoops, I misread the examples in the OPs link; for some reason I thought the lower bills were in the cooler months, and that is not the case. Still, my question stands with regards to wanting to make apples-to-apples comparisons]

Re: Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years

#5

Post by jws »

byoung2 wrote: post #2

He might have saved even more electricity had he gotten a laptop with the same specs as the mini. My Dell Inspiron 1525 has a 65W power supply, vs the similarly-equipped Mac Mini's 110W, and that 65W includes the screen. Adding an LCD to the Mac Mini adds another 30-50W.

Your power supply only documents an upper bound. It does not tell how much power your device actually uses.

Oddly, on laptops the power supply may not even be capable of satisfying the peak power consumption. There are laptops that can only go to full peak usage if they have their battery in and charged. The charger just covers average consumption plus charging current.

Re: Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years

#6

Post by tibbon »

byoung2 wrote: post #2

He might have saved even more electricity had he gotten a laptop with the same specs as the mini. My Dell Inspiron 1525 has a 65W power supply, vs the similarly-equipped Mac Mini's 110W, and that 65W includes the screen. Adding an LCD to the Mac Mini adds another 30-50W.

Is that the Mini's power supply max rating, or its average power draw?

I'm guessing the mini has a bit of extra power for USB devices and when the processors really kick it up. Would be fairly easy to test... where's my multimeter..

Re: Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years

#7

Post by brk »

byoung2 wrote: post #2

He might have saved even more electricity had he gotten a laptop with the same specs as the mini. My Dell Inspiron 1525 has a 65W power supply, vs the similarly-equipped Mac Mini's 110W, and that 65W includes the screen. Adding an LCD to the Mac Mini adds another 30-50W.

While your suggestion is along the right lines, keep in mind that computer power supplies are not like lightbulbs. They are spec'd to rate the maximum power they can produce to the device (and thereby draw). So, your 110W power supply is not drawing a constant 110W in the way a 110W light bulb would always being drawing 2x the power of a 55W lightbulb (all else being equal).

That being said, it is reasonable to assume that a PC with a 65W supply will generally use less power than one with a 110W supply, but much would depend on the use.

Re: Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years

#8

Post by trebor »

byoung2 wrote: post #2

He might have saved even more electricity had he gotten a laptop with the same specs as the mini. My Dell Inspiron 1525 has a 65W power supply, vs the similarly-equipped Mac Mini's 110W, and that 65W includes the screen. Adding an LCD to the Mac Mini adds another 30-50W.

Quite so, my Studio 1555 is a 65W unit and my LCD monitor is now aging. Even with my 60W Acer AL1916W drawing power I use less than the Mac Mini would. And when I don't need it I turn off the LCD.

Doing a little math based off my electrical bill, my laptop and LCD (together) cost me $112.57/yr USD. At roughly $240/yr for the Mac Mini alone ... I'd say that my Dell laptop wins out.

Re: Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years

#9

Post by Periodic »

icey wrote: post #4

Where do you live? If it's somewhere warm I'd say not having fans might be part of your cost savings. It would be much more compelling if you were giving us an apples-to-apples comparison with regards to the dates. My electricity bills in the winter are 1/6th what they are in the summer (although that's due to air conditioning). [Edit: whoops, I misread the examples in the OPs link; for some reason I thought the lowe…

Mine is the opposite, for not having AC. Winter bills are much higher.

The month of the change is probably a very important factor. If you make the change between January and February, or June and July, the weather is probably a minimal factor if at all.

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