Any netbook that consumes less that 1.9 Watt running idle with screen off ?

Just wondering if the new processors, chipsets used in the new netbooks can beat the power consumption of the MSI U115 ...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiOD2GLTcMo&feature=related

 

Probably anything with a processor less than a Z530, like my viliv s5 with a Z520. Basically most the Z-series (Silverthorne) processors have a TDP of 2 watts (I think the Z540 has a 4watt TDP), but with the other components combined... my viliv gets a reliable 6hrs of runtime with a 24whr battery. That in itself was amazing to me the first month I had the device. I keep wondering to myself how long my viliv would run if it had a 65whr or 75whr battery. It already has a 200hr standby time. The Atom Z-series is pretty amazing IMO.

 

Looking for a netbook of the same size to compare apples to apples..

 

That low power consumption depends on what you are doing / not doing. See here. The key to the U115's good battery performance seems to be having Windows on a small SSD so the HDD can power down unless it is being accessed. That saves a Watt or two compared to other netbooks with only HDDs. In other respects the same CPUs, chipsets, displays, etc will mean that all similar netbooks will have similar power consumption with the key factor on the run time being the battery capacity.

John

 

But you can power down the HD too, no? I have mine set to turn off after 1 minute, and there is only a second of lag when it spins back up.

 

Yep, and then you have to factor in that it takes more power to spin the drive up than it does when reading/writing or just spinning idle.

 

What other netbooks you know that have similar hardware ?

 

No other netbooks that are similar to this MSI ?

 

If you upgrade a plain vanilla netbook with an SSD, I'm sure you'll be able to cut 1-2 watts off the total power consumption. My brother's Dell Mini 10v hovers around 6-7 watts on battery with the display on, so if you take another watt or two off, you can potentially get around 4-6 watts total power consumption. Then, take another 2-3 watts off from the display (my guess - not sure how much power the 10" display would consume) and you're at around the same power consumption.

I think the main difference between that MSI and many current netbooks is the SSD. The Z-series Atom also makes a difference, but usually the Atom is running below the TDP wattage anyway, so I would presume the difference is negligible.

 

Do you know of a netbook with such a SSD ?

 

As noted, you have to consider the amount of power the hard drive takes to spin up. My Hitachi 7K500, for example, uses 0.89W of idle power but takes 4.7W at startup - that is a 5.28x multiplier. If your hard drive is spinning up often then there is a chance you are using more power than you are saving by having it shut off every minute.

Lots of startups = more wear and tear on the hard drive as well. Most hard drives will last through thousands of startups . . . it is up to you whether you want to take that kind of gamble though.

 

It would probably be better for your wallet if you did an SSD replacement after-market. To my knowledge, most current netbooks use 2.5" drives. The current Intel SSDs have very low power consumption, so you can look into those. I'm not sure it'll be worth it installing a $200 drive (the price of the 80GB Intel) into a $250 netbook, though...

 

Yeah a 16gb or so SSD from newegg to replace the regular 2.5'' hard drive would probably be the best bet.

 

16GB is cuttin it kinda close. After formatting and putting the OS on it you are cutting it very close. I'd go with a 32GB one. Maybe a SLC 32GB drive since lower capacity drives are actually economically viable to buy in SLC and are faster use less power and are more reliable.

 

What specific SSD would you recommend ? (it certainly has to consume the same or less than my present one )

 

Get a 2.5" sd-Sata/zif (depending on the netbook of your choice) with 1-64GBGB SD card and you can easily get lower power ussage with larger capacity than the one included in the MSI netbook.

 

Does anyone know of netbooks with a SSD ?

 

what is the real question here? Do you need to run some kind of windows OS for a certain minimum amount of time in a certain form factor, are you OS independent (linux or mac acceptable) or is this a research project?