Saving $ w/ energy saver power strip

[teedublu]

Now that I've got windows 7 advanced power setting "wake timers" enabled, I'm able to reliably let the system suspend.

I used an energy saving power strip -- has a master outlet that has a current sense probe to switch the slave outlets off. The $20 Phillips unit (at Walmart) works well, although the strip layout/design is kinda funky (don't get the Cyberpower, it has lousy outlet prongs etc.)

I plugged in my HDHR, HD-PVR, and Cable STB into the energy saver slave outlets. So when the server suspends, all the external boxes turn off. So far, I haven't had any problems.

I still keep the inactive timer up to about 75 minutes to make sure Sage sets the wake timers. I have not figured out how to check them -- can't find any entries in windows schedule event gui. Anyone know where to look?

TW

[Spectrum]

Not sure about checking the wake timers, but this is a good way to force HDPVR resets for stability

[Fuzzy]

I know some, especially sat boxes, may have a problem with this though, as after full power off, they may have up to a 15 minute wake time to get programming data. no, this wouldn't be needed for sage, but it would prevent consistent channel change until complete.

[paulbeers]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

I know some, especially sat boxes, may have a problem with this though, as after full power off, they may have up to a 15 minute wake time to get programming data. no, this wouldn't be needed for sage, but it would prevent consistent channel change until complete.

Yes exactly. Considering Sage would be coming out of sleep a lot of times to record something, it would be annoying to miss the recording because my SAT boxes (especially my VIP211) take forever to boot up.

I know here in the USA (and especially the midwest), power is pretty cheap compared to other parts of the USA and the world, but I leave mine on full at all times. The power is pretty minimal as long as you have Cool n' Quiet (or Speedstep if Intel) enabled even with 9 drives going at one time. I also use 80+ certified power supplies (in fact my newest Sage box that I am building right now is using an 80+ Gold certified power supply and will get around 90% effeciency: Seasonic X650).

Anyway, these are solely my opinions.

[teedublu]

Don't forget that Sage has a setting to configure how long before recording starts to wake the system (default is 2 min) -- to allow for drive spin up etc. Before I bought the strip, I experimented via unplug-replug power. The setting is available in the setup menu (under Advanced, or something). I upped it to 3, just to make sure, although it was ready in about a minute.

TW

[PolloLoco]

I just started dabbling in the power options after reading this thread. I didn't realized that the Balanced plan does power-stepping for the processor, I didn't even know that desktops did that stuff. I had my main PC and HTPC on the High Performance setting which doesn't step down processor power.

Will my HD100 wake up the HTPC if it wants to watch TV? I assume this might be Wake-on-LAN.

I now realize that my nMedia HTPC case probably has an IR keyboard option (I bought an RF keyboard for it). My last nMedia case did, and I could use that to turn on the HTPC when I want to watch live TV (it connects via USB and that will wake a computer from suspend). I can use my Logitech Harmony to send a keystroke when I choose the "Watch SageTV" activity.

I'll have to play around with this a bit. My power costs $0.08/KWh and my first electric bill of $213 for 23 days of service was a real kicker, granted the AC is the main beast drawing the power in this house. Any power-saving power strip will eventually pay for itself over time.

Originally Posted by Spectrum

Not sure about checking the wake timers, but this is a good way to force HDPVR resets for stability

That was the first thing that I thought when I saw the thread title.

[PolloLoco]

I got a power-saving power strip from walmart for $18.88 but now I have found a problem. Too often I have to run the Hauppauge Restart IR program to get the satellite box tuner and remote to work for my HD-PVR. How do I setup the task scheduler to run the program after resuming from standby on Windows 7? I've tried several options but I cannot get it to work. As of now I've returned to keeping it on 24/7.

[rtengvad]

No, the hd-100 and 200 doesn't do wake on lan. So you have to wake up the server another way. A connected Squeezebox can do that eg. I'm using Auto Shutdown Manager (http://www.enviprot.de/) to control my power settings. My server is set to wake up every afternoon and keep awake until midnight. After that it goes to standby after 17 min of inactivity.

The program can also be set to run a specific software on every wake up.

Rasmus