Timothy Hume wrote:
Hi,
My current PC is not very healthy. I am considering building a new low
power consumption machine. I want something a bit more powerful than a
Soekris, but it doesn't have to be the fastest machine around. I will
be using the machine for web browsing, Email, managing my digital
photos
web browsing implying mozilla products? Or do you like lynx?
If Mozilla stuff, you want MASSIVELY more powerful than a Soekris.
digital photos implies a fair amount of storage, as well. If "managing"
your digipics means more than "cp" and "rm", then again, you need some CPU.
> and so on. The main requirement is that the machine is quiet
and has a low power consumption so I can leave it on all the time. I
obviously want to build something which works "perfectly" with
OpenBSD.
Is it possible to build something like I describe which uses under 30
Watts, and if so, what hardware would people recommend?
a PIII-class system with an i810 chipset will probably come in below 30W
when idle. (Other chipsets may, too...but I put the Wattmeter on a
500MHz PIII with an i810 chipset, with both a real disk and a flash
disk, and it came in at under 30W when CPU was idle).
HOWEVER, if you kick your numbers up a little, to maybe 50W, I think you
will find most simple P4 systems will do nicely for you, and be a lot
less painful for graphical web browsing and image editing.
Get a wattmeter. Great investment...
Much of what people assume is not overly accurate.
Nick.
