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PC gamers use ridiculous amount of energy

statham

Member
The study found that high-end gaming systems are the fastest growing type of gaming platform around, even outpacing sales of next-gen consoles from Microsoft and Sony. So much for PC gaming dying, eh?
The study further discovered that gaming PCs collectively consumed 75 terawatt-hours of electricity ($10 billion) in 2012. That’s roughly 20 percent of the total PC, notebook and console energy use despite the fact that gaming PCs made up just 2.5 percent of global installed PC equipment. At the current pace, researchers believe consumption could more than double by 2020.
On average, the study estimates that the typical gaming computer consumes roughly 1,400kWh of energy per year. That’s equivalent to the energy consumed by 10 consoles, six standard PCs or three refrigerators. What’s more, hardcore gamers could easily consume double that amount or more.
My GPU uses 130 watts, I'm energy efficient
more here
http://www.techspot.com/news/62009-...ridiculous-amount-energy-consumed-gaming.html
 

DocSeuss

Member
This is why it always baffles me when someone says consoles can be on par with PC graphics. Like... console wattage can only get you so far, y'know? At some point, three graphics card sucking up like 750 watts or something is just going to outperform.
 

Zolf

Member
I need to pick up another R9 290 for Crossfire but my power supply isn't in the megawatt range.
 

Ogimachi

Member
It's not "wasted energy" at all, so there's absolutely no problem, considering the amount of energy actually being wasted elsewhere.
 
There you go. If you choose PC gaming over console, you're destroying the world.

Heh.

This seems right, although console gamers make up for it in the energy they waste to constantly bitch in system wars on forums

HEH!

OT: I have a 620W PSU and run a stock i5-3570K and a factory OC'd EVGA GTX 970. My computer doesn't run 24/7 either so I doubt I come close to any of these figures.
 

BasilZero

Member
^ Beaten somewhat l0l

There you go. If you choose PC gaming over console, you're destroying the world.

tumblr_mezy08dbze1qbm00wo1_500.gif
 

statham

Member
to play the devil,PC gamers have no online fees but they will have higher monthly electricity bills, does it even out?
 
PC gaming is the hottest trend this year, and with AMD and NVidia vying for market share it's going to get even hotter! And in other news, California is on fire... with over 70% of gamers now using PC!
 

10k

Banned
So now instead of turning down our graphics settings for more frames or better performance we're gonna do it to save energy/the planet?

:p
 
So... If consoles use around 80-100 watts, let's say. That means the average gaming pc uses 800-1000 watts?

Are they talking exclusively about people with quad sli rigs or something?

There you go. If you choose PC gaming over console, you're destroying the world.

Tell your energy providers to git gud, noob.
 
It's not "wasted energy" at all, so there's absolutely no problem, considering the amount of energy actually being wasted elsewhere.

I agree with you, but one should need to not underestimate the amount of amateur PC builders who put 800W or 1000W PSU in their low- and mid-tier machines which would be fine with 500W PSU. Thankfully, the problem isn't as big as in 2000s when notebooks were expensive and niche and pre-built PCs weren't as popular as custom-made ones - now most of amateurs moved out to pre-built solutions.
 

benny_a

extra source of jiggaflops
I think the numbers in this image are greatly exaggerated:
2015-09-04-image-15.jpg


Of course I don't run a Titan setup but more than twice than what PC uses for active gaming is a bit much.
(And a non-optimized PC using over 200 W to surf the web?)

They also count in the display in this setup and sure, if you're using a triple display setup with the GPUs to match that but even within the enthusiast market that can't be a big percentage.

Edit: It seems they base those numbers partially on gaming benchmarks power consumption results. I haven't looked into but I don't know how representative this is about actual game usage. In my experience I can have 50 Watt difference between different games.
 

Stumpokapow

listen to the mad man
None of the article mentions whether this conclusion--or rather, the magnitude of it--is a function of the fact that PCs are left on most/all the time even when not gaming, while consoles are generally turned off
 
If a really high end pc uses 500 watts while gaming and is used to game 3 hours a day every day, that's ~550 kWh per year... Where the fuck are they getting the 1400 figure from?
 

Dio

Banned
None of the article mentions whether this conclusion--or rather, the magnitude of it--is a function of the fact that PCs are left on most/all the time even when not gaming, while consoles are generally turned off

Yes, this. People use their PCs for stuff that isn't just videogames.
 

statham

Member
None of the article mentions whether this conclusion--or rather, the magnitude of it--is a function of the fact that PCs are left on most/all the time even when not gaming, while consoles are generally turned off

not for my xbox, all my TV viewing is through it, it stays on aslong as I'm awake.
 
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