

Mac Mini Pays for Itself After 2 Years - sahaj
http://cjgill.wordpress.com/2009/10/25/free-mini/

======
Periodic
A few people are debating the numbers, but I think there's a much more
important message here. Consumers rarely factor in the total cost of ownership
(TCO) of a computer, and only look at the retail price.

I used to think this way, particularly because I didn't have much money, so I
needed to buy the cheapest computer I could at a given time, resulting in
paying more over the lifetime of the computer (which might not be that long).

It was only once I began working with data centers when I realized what a huge
amount the power and cooling bills could be. In a datacenter, the power and
cooling requirements of a high-end system can easily be more than the cost of
buying the system initially. A great example is Western Digital's new "Green"
2TB drives. The drive costs more $/GB initially than two 1TB drives, even when
you factor in the cost of housing the drives; but if you look at the power
required by the hard drives (and hard drives really do pull a lot of energy)
the 2TB drives can come out cheaper. The same analysis applies to SSD drives.

If you want to be smart with your money, and have more in the long run, don't
forget to account for ALL the costs you'll incur when compared to another
solution. This applies to just about everything, not just computers.

~~~
staunch
Saving on power in the datacenter is one of the worst ways to try to save
money, in my experience.

It varies greatly, but $10 million dollars worth of servers, network gear, and
storage might cost $25k/mo in power. Shaving 5% or 10% off that bill is
practically meaningless. You can save a lot more money in other ways.

Obviously at massive scale (think Google) it's a different story, but for the
average small-medium company it's not even worth thinking about until you've
gone after everything else.

~~~
swernli
While I agree that for those numbers, 5% to 10% savings isn't worth the
effort, this isn't a good reason to dismiss saving by reducing data center
power. Nissan recently starting rolling out virtualization solutions for some
of their datacenters, resulting in 34% energy savings. For the kind of numbers
you list, that would end up being over $100k of savings a year.

~~~
staunch
I found the press release you were referencing:
[http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/server_virtuali...](http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/server_virtualization/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=218100715)

It proves exactly my point: That focusing on power usage is backwards. You
should worry about other stuff, like using less servers.

The guy that worries about using less servers can consolidate 159 servers to
28. He saves $5 million dollars and $10k/mo. The guy that worries about power
usage itself just buys 159 slightly less power hungry servers. He saves
$2k/mo.

~~~
swernli
Ah, now I understand the distinction you are making. And I agree; get fewer
servers, not the same number of slightly more efficient ones, and then you can
talk about saving money on power.

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Tichy
Oh come on...

Computers get more efficient all the time. My last power hungry desktop was
replaced with a mobile ultra low voltage CPU notebook. Guess it paid for
itself, too. But it wasn't from Apple, so I didn't make a fuss about it.

You know what, since you are so good at maths, I could sell you my old car for
10000 bucks. That way you would save 20000 bucks because you would not have to
buy a more expensive car instead.

~~~
elblanco
Whenever Apple takes a crap, fanboys flock to the stall to comment about how
smart the smell is, and how stylish the toilet paper is. How only Apple could
produce turds of such quality because they really, you know, _think_ about
what goes into the process and their specially formulated fiber diet is a
totally unique combination of oats and bran that you simply _can't_ replicate
in the Windows or Linux world. So you have to pay 3x the price for that
formulation.

And then blogs are filled with how it's all just so totally brilliant.

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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.

~~~
tedunangst
They don't make laptops with 42" screens, which is what he has attached to the
mini.

~~~
byoung2
You could just as easily connect a 42" screen to the laptop, as I sometimes do
using my laptop's HDMI out. It will still end up using less power than the Mac
Mini.

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jws
Rule of thumb: for each watt your always on device consumes, you will pay
$1/year in electricity. (at $0.12/kwHr, common US price)

You folks in Silicon Valley are paying 50% more than that for your
electricity, so adjust accordingly.

His savings are high, $233/year which says to me he saved 150 watts, which
seems a touch on the high side, but if his Pavilion did not sleep well (common
in PCs) and his Mini does it would be right on the button.

~~~
tedunangst
An always on torrent server, as described in the article, doesn't sleep.

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ptomato
Possibly a title reworking is in order so it looks less like spam...

edit: exactly, thanks.

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erikstarck
Side benefit of low power: low noise.

That's actually the first thing I check when buying a new computer. How silent
is it?

~~~
chrisbolt
The Mac Mini is almost completely silent unless the CPU is being maxed for
long enough (a few minutes), causing the fan to kick in.

~~~
Tichy
No it isn't. I tried to use my PowerPC Mini as a homeserver, but my gf
complained about the constant noise, so I had to switch it off. The fan is
spinning continuously.

~~~
GeneralMaximus
Wasn't the PPC notorious for running hot? My Intel Mac runs completely silent
unless I'm building something from source.

(I have no experience with PPC Macs. Comment solely based on anecdotal
evidence. Correct me if I'm wrong.)

~~~
mbreese
G4 Powerbooks (PPC) were known to cause severe burns to people. So much so
that Apple never called them laptops because you couldn't use them on your
lap. (Granted, those people were wearing shorts and had the computer on bare
skin, and the heat built up slowly so you didn't notice it).

Point being, the PPC Macs ran damn hot. My old G4 powerbook ran hotter than my
current MacBook Pro. IIRC, notebook cooling and power requirements were the
main reasons for the switch to Intel chips.

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graywh
There are too many other factors to consider when looking at the final bill.
Next time, use an in-line power use monitor and tell us about it.

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aidenn0
I have a similar experience.

I got used to having a linux server on 24/7 when I was in college (no
electricity bill in the dorms).

I moved to California when I graduated, and was spending over $40/month on
electricity. I borrowed a friends kill-a-watt and measured my server at
180W-220W depending on the load!

I put together a machine based around the Via C7 and measured it as using 18W
at the outlet. The whole thing cost a bit over $300. Also, no fan, which is
nice as the server is now in my living room. As soon as SSDs get cheap enough,
I'll have a no-moving-parts server.

~~~
gonzo
I've got an Atom-powered rackmount firewall
([http://www.netgate.com/product_info.php?cPath=60_107&pro...](http://www.netgate.com/product_info.php?cPath=60_107&products_id=793)),
a fanless rackmount HP ProCurve GigE switch, and a 2009 series Mac Mini
running the home/business network. The rest is done with notebooks.

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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]

~~~
Periodic
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.

------
jdbeast00
auto sleep your computer after x minutes of idle. done.

~~~
tptacek
Can you wake it up with an IR remote? If not, then auto-sleep is a non-starter
for a set-top box. Just for example.

~~~
mrkurt
The Media Center remotes will wake/sleep your system. Windows Media Center
does a fantastic job with sleep, actually. It'll wake up to record, then go
back to sleep. If you hit "sleep" while it's recording, it will shut off the
video output, then sleep when it's done.

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briansmith
I'm not sure how they justify their claim that the Mac Mini is the most power
efficient desktop. According to another post in this discussion, the average
draw under load is approximately 35W. The Lenovo M58 & M58p--which have been
out since December, 2008--also draws an average 35W under load, and are also
EPEAT Gold and Energy Star 5.0 rated. I believe HP has had a similar product
for a while too; probably every PC maker does.

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bemmu
Where is the wasted energy lost to? If it is lost to heat and you have
electric heating in your house, would that lead to a correspondingly lowered
heating bill?

~~~
bjelkeman-again
Yes, but you really don't want to heat your house or your hot water with
straight electric radiators or water heaters. Use a heat pump. A heat pump
will give you a 30-40% lower electricity bill.

I have a heat pump which takes heat from the ground (two boreholes) and for
every 1kWh of electricity I put into it I get 2.5-3 kWh equivalent of heating
in my house. This is essentially stored solar heat in the ground which I use
the heat pump to transfer into my house. The electricity comes from regional
hydropower. With electricity usage for heating without the heatpump of roughly
50,000 kWh and an electric price of about 15 US cent for the kWh, this knocks
off a significant piece of the electricity bill, down to about 18,000 kWh and
gives lower environmental impact.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_pump#Ground_source_heat_pu...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_pump#Ground_source_heat_pumps)

Also, reversely, if you are in a warm climate your aircon will have to take
all that extra heat from your computer and push it out of the house, with a
corresponding loss in efficiency.

~~~
gonzo
I was born and raised in Las Vegas, NV. So was my father. His father started a
water well drilling business in 1953, my father joined him in that business
(post collage) in 1957.

In 1980, my father decided to build a house. We (meaning _I_ ) was sent to the
property in order to drill two 800 foot deep 'wells', which were subsequently
cased with 8" (ID) steel pipe, but not perforated. (There was a 1/2" plate on
the bottom of the casing.)

After this, we filled the casing with water. (A fine test of one's skill at
welding.) Then added a 2" galvanized "loop" inside the casing, which was then
hooked in to a heat pump.

It was the single-most efficient "single family residence" HVAC system in the
state.

We subsequently added hot-water recapture to the indoor AC units, in order to
make the most of the heat "pulled" out of the house.

Dad also built the house with R-44 insulation in the walls, R-60 or so in the
attic, and a white 'Spanish tile' roof.

The result, a power bill of around $100/mo for a 5000 sq ft home in the desert
that was numbingly cold in the summer, and pleasantly warm in the winter. (It
does get cold in LV.)

It helped that 40% of the square footage was basement (something else nobody
in Las Vegas has, because it turns _hard_ about 4 feet down.)

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pistoriusp
Would love to know what his KWH consumption is per month. His electricity bill
is 1/2 mine. Is electricity generally cheap in North America?

~~~
pmjordan
I can tell you that in Europe, €0.20-0.25/kWh (about US$ 0.30-0.37, ZAR
2.20-2.80) is typical for residential customers.

~~~
zandorg
I'm not sure, but NPower in the UK appears to be 8 pence (about 12 cents).
That does seem low!

~~~
pmjordan
My figures include taxes and average amortization of any fixed costs. That
said, UK energy prices do seem to be lower than in central Europe; I'm not
sure why.

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mcantelon
My guess is something Atom-based, like the EEE Box, would save even more in
electricity.

~~~
elblanco
Correct, they use about 50% less power, plus it costs less to purchase to
start with.

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paul9290
Best home computing device I own!

It's connected to my LCD TV and acts as my source of TV/movie, etc enjoyment,
along with net surfing and conversing!

