Edit: I’m on Linux Edit 2: B550 AMD chipset
I am seeding from an AMD Ryzen 7 5700G system and with all the peripherals turned off and disconnected, instantaneous load was about 65 watts, until I undervolted it (negative 30, all cores), after which it has been fluctuating around 60 watts.
I’d like to keep seeding indefinitely - of course, my all time share ratio is at around 12 for now - but I’d like to use less energy and spend less money on it - even though the cost difference will be negligible, I guess.
Questions
- Do you have any recommendations on what hardware to switch to?
- Or any suggestions on further tweaking the power setting’s in the BIOS? For now, I’m using AMD’s AI solution for undervolting (PBO or Curve Optimizer or whatever it’s called?), but there is for instance also the actual overclocking menu, which would force settings on the CPU.
- What do you think about putting a single board computer inside my desktop (the chassi is HUGE) and somehow hooking up my four 4TB 2.5 inch torrenting SSDs to it? Possibly still powering them with my desktop’s PSU? And running the client (qBittorrent) on the SBC?
I’d love to switch to a bigger ssd, but these 4TB ones already cost me 400 bucks each… :(
Interesting about the PSU! I thought it only every output/draw as much as its “clients” demanded? Is there such a big “overhead” it whatever? :O
PSU can indeed make a pretty big difference.
If you only have a 80 Plus certified PSU, and see 65 watts drawn at the wall, your system might actually only be using 52 watts, the remaining 13 watts are wasted as heat in your PSU. 80 Plus Gold, Platinum, or Titanium all carry higher efficiencies, but also cost more to buy.
Actual efficiency is also heavily influenced by the load. Most PSUs are most efficient at 50% load. Both lower and higher loads with result in worse efficiency.
Here’s an article with some more details: https://www.technewstoday.com/power-supply-efficiency/
I had no idea. Thank you very much for explaining! It’ll be “hard” to say goodbye to my trusted ASUS ROG Strix 1000W, which is only an 80+ gold rated old boy… XD
I would consider the cost of electricity against the cost of the new PSU.
I don’t think you can run the PSU but not the other devices attached. Once it powers on, it applies power to the motherboard and it POSTs, starting the CPU and GPU and everything. If you put the PC to sleep, it’ll shut off the PSU.
You might also be able to attach a bunch of nvme/sata m.2 drives to an SBC. I’ve never investigated it. At worst, you could do it over USB, which isn’t reliable but you’re not holding critical data.