A few people are debating the numbers, but I think there's a much more important message here. Consumers rarely factor in the total cost of ownership (TCO) of a computer, and only look at the retail price.<p>I used to think this way, particularly because I didn't have much money, so I needed to buy the cheapest computer I could at a given time, resulting in paying more over the lifetime of the computer (which might not be that long).<p>It was only once I began working with data centers when I realized what a huge amount the power and cooling bills could be. In a datacenter, the power and cooling requirements of a high-end system can easily be more than the cost of buying the system initially. A great example is Western Digital's new "Green" 2TB drives. The drive costs more $/GB initially than two 1TB drives, even when you factor in the cost of housing the drives; but if you look at the power required by the hard drives (and hard drives really do pull a lot of energy) the 2TB drives can come out cheaper. The same analysis applies to SSD drives.<p>If you want to be smart with your money, and have more in the long run, don't forget to account for ALL the costs you'll incur when compared to another solution. This applies to just about everything, not just computers.
Oh come on...<p>Computers get more efficient all the time. My last power hungry desktop was replaced with a mobile ultra low voltage CPU notebook. Guess it paid for itself, too. But it wasn't from Apple, so I didn't make a fuss about it.<p>You know what, since you are so good at maths, I could sell you my old car for 10000 bucks. That way you would save 20000 bucks because you would not have to buy a more expensive car instead.
He might have saved even more electricity had he gotten a laptop with the same specs as the mini. My Dell Inspiron 1525 has a 65W power supply, vs the similarly-equipped Mac Mini's 110W, and that 65W includes the screen. Adding an LCD to the Mac Mini adds another 30-50W.
Rule of thumb: for each watt your always on device consumes, you will pay $1/year in electricity. (at $0.12/kwHr, common US price)<p>You folks in Silicon Valley are paying 50% more than that for your electricity, so adjust accordingly.<p>His savings are high, $233/year which says to me he saved 150 watts, which seems a touch on the high side, but if his Pavilion did not sleep well (common in PCs) and his Mini does it would be right on the button.
I have a similar experience.<p>I got used to having a linux server on 24/7 when I was in college (no electricity bill in the dorms).<p>I moved to California when I graduated, and was spending over $40/month on electricity. I borrowed a friends kill-a-watt and measured my server at 180W-220W depending on the load!<p>I put together a machine based around the Via C7 and measured it as using 18W at the outlet. The whole thing cost a bit over $300. Also, no fan, which is nice as the server is now in my living room. As soon as SSDs get cheap enough, I'll have a no-moving-parts server.
Where do you live? If it's somewhere warm I'd say not having fans might be part of your cost savings.<p>It would be much more compelling if you were giving us an apples-to-apples comparison with regards to the dates. My electricity bills in the winter are 1/6th what they are in the summer (although that's due to air conditioning).<p>[Edit: whoops, I misread the examples in the OPs link; for some reason I thought the lower bills were in the cooler months, and that is not the case. Still, my question stands with regards to wanting to make apples-to-apples comparisons]
I'm not sure how they justify their claim that the Mac Mini is the most power efficient desktop. According to another post in this discussion, the average draw under load is approximately 35W. The Lenovo M58 & M58p--which have been out since December, 2008--also draws an average 35W under load, and are also EPEAT Gold and Energy Star 5.0 rated. I believe HP has had a similar product for a while too; probably every PC maker does.
Where is the wasted energy lost to? If it is lost to heat and you have electric heating in your house, would that lead to a correspondingly lowered heating bill?
Best home computing device I own!<p>It's connected to my LCD TV and acts as my source of TV/movie, etc enjoyment, along with net surfing and conversing!