Desk top PC can eat over 400 watts of power just sitting there. When finished, I always put mine in "standby" or "sleep" mode which drops the power usage to a few watts. I verified these readings with one of those handy little "Kill-O-Watt" power line devices.
73, Charlie k3ICH -----Original Message----- From: Elecraft [mailto:elecraft-boun...@mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of Guy Olinger K2AV Sent: Wednesday, February 01, 2017 7:37 AM To: Dave AD6A <d...@ad6a.com>; Elecraft Reflector <elecraft@mailman.qth.net> Subject: Re: [Elecraft] KPA500 Power Supply Environmental/Ergonomic Issue While without reference to quantities I certainly agree with the sentiment, but to be focused on a night light level power is kind of like swatting at gnats while pidgeons are flying around in the kitchen. Does your attic insulation need replacing. Are all of the light fixtures in your house converted to LED. Are your refrigerators made in the current decade. Are all of your windows gas-filled double pane. Are your water heater and all the hot water piping in your house insulated. The list of things that would bury that 6 watts by a couple of orders of magnitude is quite long. Then there is this other thing specific to CPU based equipment. And that is maintaining signal states relative to other equipment. They get confused when things go cold off and aren't brought back on in a particular sequence. It was always fun when the PC folks at SAS (which is buried in PCs) had to take down a thousand or so functionally shared PCs for maintenance or something. They had to be taken off in sequence and brought back in service with a very complex and specifically ordered startup. Every now and then that group had to work all hands on deck 48 hour weekends and took naps on cots put out for the purpose. Those PCs were kept on their own AC mains with a honking monster UPS that would power my house for weeks off the grid. Power blips taking down a couple floors of PCs could put a building full of very high paid advanced programmer types sitting on their hands for a day or worse. They figured that out early and spent the money. Your Elecraft gear has some related if not so killer issues on cold starts that nevertheless result in tech support calls. Think Big E just trying to keep the noise and confusion down on the TS lines, with a method that has become pretty much standard practice. Seems to me it's been a long time since TVs had batteries in them unless it was a portable intended to be operated off mains. Paying for a service call to replace a battery gone bad was drummed out long time back. If you have a PC in the shack, do you do a shutdown when you leave? Or leave it on to get OS and virus security updates and email? Check the power draw on that. I'm trying to convince the wife to replace our 23 year old kitchen refrigerator that still works perfectly. I wish that my KPA's off state power draw was the prime offender at my house :>). 73, Guy K2AV On Tue, Jan 31, 2017 at 10:46 PM Dave AD6A <d...@ad6a.com> wrote: > I recently added a KPA500 kit for my home station. It went together > just fine, and overall I love it. > > There is one thing about the way it works that bugs the engineer and > environmentalist in me. > > > > Before I bought the PA, I thought I'd be able to turn it on/off > entirely using the ON button on the front panel. > > I thought that maybe there was a supercap or backup battery that kept > the button's electronics alive to perform the ON button function (like > TV's have in them). > > However, it doesn't work like this. In order to turn the PA off > completely, you have to turn off the main power switch on the rear panel. > > > > The front panel ON button powers up the PA from what looks like a cold > state, however, my measurements are as follows: > > > > 1. With the main power switch on the back panel turned OFF, the PA > takes no power at all (0.0W) > 2. When you turn the main power switch on the back panel to ON, the PA > draws 6.9W continuously from the 120V AC power supply > 3. When you press the front panel ON button, the PA turns "ON" and > takes around 13W (measured) in STBY mode > > > > My home station line up (K3s, P3, 2x SP3, KPA500, KAT500) sits on a > large operating desk with a shelf unit that I build above the station. > My computer monitors sit on the shelf above the radios. > > There is only just enough height clearance (about 2.5") between the > top of the KPA500 and the underside of the shelf to allow me to put my > hand over the top of the PA to reach the main power switch. > > It's fiddly but I can do it, it's just that it's a major inconvenience > not being able to turn the KPA500 truly off from the front panel. > > > > Why is the KPA500 designed this way? > > In all good conscience, I can't live with the PA consuming 7W all day, > every day - that's incredibly wasteful. > > I suppose I could put a more-easily-reachable external AC power switch > on the side of my shelf unit to cut power to the whole desk, but > that'd be ugly. > > I'd prefer that either a) the KPA500's main power switch was on the > front panel, or b) the power supply system was redesigned so it only > takes a few microwatts when power is applied but the ON button is OFF > (not pressed, or pressed an even number of times). > > > > Comments? Ideas? > > > > Cheers, > Dave AD6A > > > > > > > > --- > This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. > https://www.avast.com/antivirus > ______________________________________________________________ > Elecraft mailing list > Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft > Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm > Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net > > This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email > list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to > k2av....@gmail.com > -- Sent via Gmail Mobile on my iPhone ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to pin...@erols.com ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
