I realized something interesting what happen using Windows 8 and 8.1, compare to Windows 7: a quite huge difference in power consumption! OK, this is the story: For some special reason I was need ti install Windows 7 on my computer at home. I done that on an new HDD with 320GB, running solo for the installation by removing the power cables form the other HDD's, a total of 8 SATA3 HDD's. That was done 2 days ago and I firstly I installed only those Apps I need to use on Windows 7, no any gimmiks, whistles or bells! On Windows 8 I use Gadgets and the CPU Gadget show at middle 20%-25% while doing normal work. I also have 3 different power circuit's at my home office, to each an Ampere Meter connected. On the circuit with my computer, which is connected to an 1.2KW UPS is also the Modem/Router 4 Port, LAN Switch 8 Port and and Debian Linux Server running. 2. Power Circuit has an Survailance Server and an Mail Server running and 3. circuit is for the normal other electric use like lights, power plugs etc. Now on my computer's circuit the Amp Meter is 0-10A and with Windows 8 and 8.1 and the other devices, as pointed above, the consumption is about 2.6A-2.7A, depend on the work done on the computer. There is only 1 printer connected via the same power circuit, an Brother QL570 Thermal Label printer which is 99.8% of the time off line! Now the interesting: running Windows 7 on the exact same computer with all HDD's running, as Windows 8, the power consumption is between 2.2A and max 2.4A! So, I installed more apps, mainly now the same a s running in 8/8.1 and also the gadgets. The CPU usage is mainly between 2-6% and may goes up to 15% by heavier work but reach 20%! Both, the CPU usage and the power consumption is a quite huge difference using the exact same hardware, only difference is the OS Windows 8/8.1 vs Windows 7! In this, Windows 7 wins clearly! How is it with you Guy's? Any experiences with that too? Would be interesting to know And also I would like to wish all of you a happy new year.
You mean overall power consumption is higher in 8.x? Weird, I don't understand how my laptop gave me better battery life running 8 Pro.
I didn't talked about an Laptop, it's an high powered Desktop, 6 core CPU, 12GB, 8 HDD, 2DVD/BD! And power set o High Performances in both W7 and W8/8.1! By the way, compare with the time I was run Windows 7 and since some time now 8/8.1, the battery use is just about max. 70% of what I could run on 7 with that laptop. But that bothered me at all, I try to use as much as possible direct power with that machine for to get it run on full/high performance. And also the battery get more old and therefore lose some performance too!
Weird, On the contrary, I am experiencing significantly better battery life on my notebook with Windows 8.1...(previously it was Windows 7)..Wonder if Aero took a significant chunk of the battery power or is it improved Timer Coalescing in 8.1. The only deterministic method to compare is by powercfg.exe
I've 3 HD's with OS's for the Laptop: 750GB with Windows 8.1 WMC, 5400rpm 650GB with Windows 7 Ultimate 5400rpm 320GB with Android 4.2.3, 7200rpm and tested today while running each of them with fully charged Battery. And this is the result in same order for the HDD's: 1h 18min 1h 34min 1h 57min My friend, who is using also an Acer Laptop but with high power Battery, should run up to 8h, could use with Windows 8 max. 5h while Windows 7 he was using up to 7h, never reached 8h! I also were listen from other's that they having problems with the usage time of their batteries, various brands and Mac Books. Personally I really don't mind about that! What I mind about is: CPU usage!! As I have all my computers set to High Performance in Power Settings, that includes my Laptop too, that could be the culprit WHY the power consumption is higher in Windows 8/8.1 than in Windows 7! Just at the moment, I use Windows 7 on this machine now, the CPU usage is 10-11% while working. Same would be under Windows 8/8.1 never below 20% but more than 30% most of the times. The Memory usage is quite similar! 23% in Windows 7 while 25-27% in Windows 8.1 by 12GB, little but also still more high than in Windows 7! On the other hand, I never had an BSOD in Windows 8/8.1 but the last 3 days 5 BSOD's in Windows 7!
That's certainly not normal unless you have a Celeron from 1995. The only exception is when you mean not normal work by normal work.
Look at the footer of my post, except that I'd add more HDD's it's for both OS the same computer! And CPU is an AMD 6 Core 1100T BlackEdition! Software I run on both mainly the same and both OS's are 64bit! Maybe the work I do is a little bit higher than normal but gaming! I'm permanently connected to an AS400 by remote and 2 other servers! So any more comment?
I can confirm higher power usage with win8 over win7 too. my home file server I5-3450 8GB ram SSD primary (2) 2TB data drives (spun down) 33watt WIN7 idle 44watt WIN8.1 Update1 idle Pretty huge power change! (34%) I have not opened the server to check for dust in the fans or anything. Both readings taken with a fresh install, but about a year apart. All OS updates at the time, and CPU usage at 0-1% The only changes have been BIOS updates and WIN7-WIN8.1 Update 1 updates. *edit well that was easy, I had been wanting to blow the dust out of the server for a while. opened it up and it was pretty clean, just very light bit of dust in there. It is a 24x7 server. After cleaning it out to look good as new, there was no power consumption change. (drag on the 3 fans (case/cpu/psu), etc)
It depends what your power settings are. There are also a lot of hidden options in the powercfg that are not listed. You should not mess with any of the hidden options, but one of the more well known is the core parking setting. Win8 made many improvements to win7's power consumption for dc-based systems like tablets and notebooks. A lot of those features are probably not present in the desktop power options unless you set it to the lowest option.
Any reason why they are not enabled by default?. And another thing, how to set that options?. Please dont tell me in Power Options. It has to be somthing more elaborated
How did you get the power consumption of 33/44Watts? The power consumption of that I5-3450 CPU is 63Watt idle!! Mainboard, HDD's (1 SSD and 2 1TB SATA) and other equipment need to consume power as well!! I would say that your File-Server consume at least 280Watt/h, even more me think! My low power Linux-Server at my home with AMD FX-4100 CPU (power consumption Idle: 43Watt!!) with 2 SATA 1TB HDD's, low end Graphic Card, consume 1.2A which calculated to: 1.2A x 230V = 276Watt!! Please enlighten me how you get that low power consumption of 33 or 44Watt!
A lot of the power consumption can be reduced through bios settings. I know for my amd fx cpu there are 3 settings not counting the overclocking: c6 state HPC mode Overdrive setting I imagine that there are probably some similar settings for intel. A lot of these settings use a lot of power for like almost no performance increase.
They are enabled by default if you use the energy saver options, they just don't elaborate as to the settings they are using. I seriously wouldn't recommending trying to modify them individually. You will likely cause conflicts that could damage your system. The advanced power options are only for the ones you *should* be able to safely modify. There are much more behind the scenes.
True for the CPU! But the use I posted were at IDEL stage! And lower you couldn't go! The absolute min. Power Consumption of any FX CPU is 40Watt! I use extra and separate Power Circuits for the Computer and there also Ampere Meter attached to it. My Server also is separate from the other computers power circuit's. If the Server is running on high load, the power consumption goes up to 2A and I didn't use any overclocking! The Amp Meter is located between the UPS and the Server. If the load on the Amp is showing more that 2Amp, then something is wrong with the Server and need to be checked.
40 watts is pretty high for an idle cpu actually... Are you sure you're not talking about the entire system? chipsets and ram use power as well..
Maybe my example isn't relevant, but my MacBook Pro 15" 2012 Retina model (Ivy Bridge) suffered an hour of battery loss with Windows 8.1 Enterprise Update 1 installed in a Boot Camp partition compared with Windows 7 x64 Ultimate. Considering the Windows 7 system lasted 5 hours that's a significant difference. But I admit to not being familiar with any expert power settings that might have helped.
silly answer: PCI Express cards use additional power: Power All sizes of ×4 and ×8 PCI Express cards are allowed a maximum power consumption of 25 W. All ×1 cards are initially 10 W; full-height cards may configure themselves as 'high-power' to reach 25 W, while half-height ×1 cards are fixed at 10 W. All sizes of ×16 cards are initially 25 W; like ×1 cards, half-height cards are limited to this number while full-height cards may increase their power after configuration. They can use up to 75 W (3.3 V/3 A + 12 V/5.5 A), though the specification demands that the higher-power configuration be used for graphics cards only, while cards of other purposes are to remain at 25 W.[9][10] Optional connectors add 75 W (6-pin) or 150 W (8-pin) power for up to 300 W total (2×75 W + 1×150 W). Some cards are using two 8-pin connectors, but this has not been standardized yet, therefore such cards must not carry the official PCI-Express logo. This configuration would allow 375 W total (1×75 W + 2×150 W) and will likely be standardized by PCI-SIG with the PCI-Express 4.0 standard. The 8-pin PCI-Express connector could be mistaken with the EPS12V connector, which is mainly used for powering SMP and multi-core systems.
Wait, it was you the one who said that 8/8.1 consumes (a lot) more than 7. So, by default they not are enabled. And again, if the system is configured by default, to consume more, whats the point. And another thing, I dont think if you change the BIOS values would change how the OS is working, because of what you said.