Power Saving Extension Board
 

One of the usual Indians rolled up the other day but instead of per usual trying to flog off an alternate electronic company he was giving away free (his company would sell Carbon credits to the gubmint) a power board. This has sockets one marked normal, and some master and slaves.

It has a IR chip as well and what happens is after an hour if it doesnt detect any remote control action it will flash for three minutes, if during these three minutes you do not adjust the TV by the remote (he said just move the volume up and down) it will power down the unit completely, no standby.

Seems to work ok and even without the standby the TV (50 inch Plasma) seems to start up without waiting too long. My only question is is this equivalent of switching it off at the mains likely to cause any problems with the TVs innards?

My only question is is this equivalent of switching it off at the mains likely to cause any problems with the TVs innards? no. the mains switch goes to the tv on/off switch first so it doesn't matter which one you use.

Nope.
As you noted, it'll take a bit longer to power up, and some cheaper models may not retain the previous settings (eg input, volume), but that's about it.

I reckon it might actually lead to increased electricity use. I wouldnt but I have been in familys where the TV is on a lot and I reckon kiddies will just learn not to turn off TVs (something they struggle with anyway) because it turns itself off. Multiply by millions of TVs in homes with young familys and a habit they will take into adult life…

I don't think it's intended as an alternative to turning it off in the normal way (onto standby with the remote), but more so that after it's been on standby for a while it'll cut the standby power.

I have a powerboard with a master socket and several slave sockets, if the power draw through the master socket goes below a certain limit it'll completely cut power to everything on the board. Downside is you need to manually hit the main on/off switch for whatever is in the master socket.

i have a hand with fingers that turn stuff off at the wall when i go to bed. but then i'm anal like that.

;-)

Which, even though the VoltsCommisioner wouldn't agree, will save sod all power in the scheme of things. I do beleive that every little bit counts, but some bits are so small as to have no effect.
Once people turn off their lights and ceiling & pedestal fans when they're not in a room, then reducing standby power loads will have a significant effect.

Not being the kiddies father I cannot demand or force anything like that you're house your rules. if it isn't your house then....

:-)

I tried deleteing that post, it makes no sense, I misread your post complety was distracted.

I'm not sure about the power savings either. We had a master switch installed on the TV/Sound systems when we removed all the powerboards and replaced them with GPOs a while ago. The bonus with kids is that they can't turn anything on without asking. Seems lots of families just have the TV on all the time and find it strange when it's off. They used to arrive and turn the TV on on autopilot and then wander off.

I doubt it saves us any noticeable amount of power, but is potentially useful by stopping things being turned on for no reason.

I can't see the economic sense in paying someone to go around giving way free powerboards, which will save bugger all power anyway, just to claim a few cents in carbon credits.

If the carbon credits are valuable enough to make that a business, then why can't I sell them each time I turn something off at the wall too.

Also, I should be able to make a killing on the carbon market each time I stop a bushfire.

Just sounds like some sort of scam to me.

Bushfires create charcoal. That gets incorporated into the soil and sequesters carbon. So over the life of the plants that burn, there is a small incremental sequestration of carbon each time there is a fire.

Not that long ago the CFA was sponsored by some carbon credit co. to put low wattage green lightbulbs, no problems with them.

As an example of TV power consumption when off a Panasonic plasma TV draws 0.4W so we are not talking big savings here.

The old CRT TVs (remember back when TVs had those large glass bottles in the front?) would often keep the CRT filament warm so they would take less time to warm up. These would chew a few Watts in standby.

You are selling your bit of energy reducing credits when they get a market thing and selling it back as compensation...

>>>My only question is is this equivalent of switching it off at the mains likely to cause any problems with the TVs innards?

Nope, but would add dodgy sockets with intermittent connections on power boards [especially cheaper ones] aren't good with equipment that draws substantial current. For example take a PA amp which driven to high power will change its clipping threshold with fluctuating mains supply as unit supply rails will be all over the place.

My TV when turned off at the mains comes back on on the same channel etc, so is good that way.

The two better inverters I use [am on solar with 12Volt system] have variable setting for auto standby, you can adjust the lower current draw detection threshold. Some quiescent current is required for inverter operation, for biasing and such, so it reduces this by auto load detect and auto-standby. There's maybe couple of downsides to this, being slower operation as comes out of standby, and maybe they have to pulse check for load, which of the latter maybe can pulse lights.