Monitor Draws Zero Power In Standby

fifthace writes "A new range of Fujitsu Siemens monitors don't draw power during standby. The technology uses capacitors and relays to avoid drawing power when no video signal is present. With political parties all over Europe calling for a ban on standby, this small development could end up as one of the most significant advances in recent times. The British Government estimates eight percent of all domestic electricity is consumed by devices in standby."

power isnt free

Then it just draws EXTRA power while running, to charge the capacitors. Electricity can't be produced from nothing.

A more useful version would be one that used solar cells on the top of the LCD to absorb the already expended energy of ambient lighting.

Re:power isnt free

Then it just draws EXTRA power while running, to charge the capacitors. Electricity can't be produced from nothing.

Yes, but it only draws enough electricity to fill the capacitors instead of constantly drawing enough power to bring the monitor out of standby.

Sure you're going to use some extra electricity to come out of standby, but this does cut down on that amount in a vast manner.

The biggest wastage is in the power supply itself

You don't need much power to run a very small 8-bit micro, enough to wake a sleeping monitor. We're talking about nano Amps here. A cheap capacitor can keep that going for months.

The biggest wastage in taditional designs is that they use switch mode power supplies designed to run at full power. They don't operate very efficiently at very low (standby) power. It is far better to completely turn off the power supply and just use a local capacitor to keep the micro going.

Re:power isnt free

A relay cuts off the mains power whenever the video stream stops; capacitors store enough charge to flick the relay back when the signal returns. Solar panels provide enough power to maintain zero consumption mode for up to five days, after which you have to press a regular power button to bring the machine out of standby.

There's a difference here, and that is that this new monitor will draw enough power to wake itself out of standby, and then not draw anymore power. Normal monitors generally go into standby, and then continue consuming power, which is less wpoer than an idle screen, but still more than just enough to charge some capacitors.

I don't see it as winning a prize for groundbreaking-innovation, though.

Re:power isnt free

Nope, it's the absolutely worst use of solar panels. They could just draw mains power for one second every 6 hours. As it is, there is pollution created by manufacturing the panels, added cost for a component that does not add functionality and serious cases of remote control rage. And let's not get started on ceiling-mounted TVs.

Re:power isnt free

Dude... Think about it. They're using capacitors and relays in order to detect a video signal and respond to it. Think of it like a mousetrap. It can remain armed for a long time without using any of the stored energy. The mousetrap is not powered while on standby mode, nor does it draw-down the energy from the spring.

Re:power isnt free

I agree with you wrt the uselessness of soft-power settings on computer monitors. I habitually hit the "real" power switch on my (circa 1998 or so, so it has both) monitor when I'm going to leave for a while, rather than just leaving it to go into standby. Mostly because it tends to come out of 'sleep' at the slightest whim.

But the real reason for all those soft-power settings I think has less to do with powering on than it does with powering off. Most devices don't like to be daisy-chained and controlled by a remote source, like lots of analog electronics were, because they can't stand having their power cut abruptly.

In other words, it's the "shut down" procedure that's the killer, not the "start up" one. Lots of devices perform little rituals when you turn them off, writing settings to non-volatile memory for instance, that analog electronics just don't have to do. Because of this, you need to make sure that the user doesn't really have control over the device's whole power. So instead of a real switch, the user gets a soft-power button. That way, they can press it, and the device can start shutting down, and do its thing. But this basically necessitates 'standby' rather than 'off,' in order to be able to start up from the soft power button.

Remote controls are the other driving force, but there are lots of devices that do 'standby' now, that don't have remotes. I think it's often because they have a power-off procedure; if you designed devices so that they could be unplugged at any time without consequence, then you could go back to centrally-controlled, daisy-chained power supplies.

Same thing only different.

I believe the proper term is "hibernate". When my laptop is in standby, it still draws power. But when I close the lid on my laptop, and it goes into hibernation mode, it draws no power until I open the lid again. The same could be said of these monitors. They draw no power until a user does something analogous to me opening the lid on my laptop.

Re:Same thing only different.

They're referring to the electronics standby not computer OS standby. Nearly all electronic devices (TVs, monitors, computers, etc) are on standby unless they're unplugged. This allows you to turn on the device with an electronic switch or a remote rather than a physical switch because part of the electronics are still "on". The surprising thing is some electronics are incredibly inefficient at standby. I tested some PSUs which would use 4 watts while the computer was "off". If you start adding up the number of electronic gadgets in your home, the watts start adding up all while your stuff is doing absolutely nothing.

it's got an LED on it, too

A new range of Fujitsu Siemens monitors don't draw power during standby.

The monitor might not, but what about the power brick? those things consume power even if no monitor is attached.

Where's the OFF switch

I just want an Off switch on my printers and scanners! Or if they do have one, put it in the front. I use my scanner once a month, it's crazy to leave it plugged in all the time (no power switch). My printer's power switch is way around at the back, hard to reach - I only print once or twice a week. At least my LCD has an off button on the front, but it is never really off.

Re:Where's the OFF switch

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powerstrip [wikipedia.org]

Annoying LEDs?

I like this trend. If a device wants to consume 0 power on standby then it finally means that they'll stop putting those damn blue LEDs on everything electronic. Then I could have a dark bedroom at night without the use of electrical tape.

Bad power factor is the real problem

Most very low power modern devices have nasty power factors. PC power supplies tend to be .6 to .8. CFLs run from about .2 to .6 while many phone charges are about .2. That means for every watt delivered to the phone, there line losses in the grid are at least 3 W if not more. There are also losses in the generator so getting 1 Watt into your phone (or CFL) may require more power than putting 5W into a resistive load.

Only 2 to 4W difference

Yes it's still a good thing, but meanwhile has anyone invented an airconditioner/heater or car that's much more efficient but at the same time as practical and as affordable as the conventional stuff?

My airconditioner uses at least 1kW. 1 hour of airconditioning = 20 days of monitor standby.

For those of you who live in countries that need central heating, the standby power isn't going to hurt as much during winter since you want stuff warmer anyway.

I need a better designed house (to reduce cooling bills etc), but I can't afford one... An "Energy Star" legislation for houses here might be good, but I'm worried the builders will just use it as a way to make a lot more money.

Re:instead

Empirically, they can't. It does not matter why, unless with that answer comes some insight into how to change it. It would appear that simply telling them to do better has no impact. If *you* want to save power, then that method has some hope of success. If a large organization or society wants to save power, that method is almost hopeless. So, given that you can't just tell people to conserve energy and expect it to work, what can you do? Incentives or mandates for more efficient standby modes is one solution that might actually have an impact.

Re:instead

If you switch the devices on/off all the time, then they don't last very long. One reason why modern electronic devices last for decades without failure, is due to not ever being really switched off.

Oh crap. Maybe mechanical devices might have a problem - like spinning down and spinning up your hard drive - but not electrical devices. Modern electronic devices haven't been around for decades, maybe just over one. Most old fashioned electoronics - like old TVs and radios - did get turned on and off (they had no standby) and they did last decades.

Modern devices barely last five years before needing replacing. Add the fact that they chew up power when they are in "stand-by" and I wonder what the definition of "progress" really is.

Re:The most frustrating thing is....

Not necessarily. If the two polarizers are in parallel, then, yes, it has to twist the light as it goes through to block it. But if the two polarizers are perpendicular, then black is the "default state", and light is blocked unless the liquid crystal twists it to let it through the second polarizer. (My Sony CLIE (SL-10) was like this -- it turned black when the device was off. It looked nice.)

Re:The most frustrating thing is....

CRT != LCD...

Re:The most frustrating thing is....

Well, he was talking about CRTs. And you are wrong on both counts. On a CRT more current flows to make the screen white. For an LCD, just remove the signal or power from the screen, but not the light and the pixels go "black". However...transmitting black over air takes more energy. And the sync pulse, even more.

Re:The most frustrating thing is....

Most of the power in a CRT goes into the H/V beam deflection electromagnets, not the electron gun. The H/V scanning electronics operate regardless of which color is being rendered. The filament heater also uses about 6W whenever the CRT is turned on. Between displaying 100% white at the highest brightness and the blackest black at the lowest brightness, there is only a 5-10% difference depending on resolution and refresh rates.

As for Fujitsu's 0W-standby monitor, they conveniently omit the fact that this extra relay's coil and related components will be drawing an extra 1W or so while the monitor/TV is on. I would prefer that they perfected ultra-low-power standby like 1W as the current typical appliance has 4-10W standby power: having standby rely on capacitors means standby would not work as expected every now and then if it's been too long since the previous power-up.

These people are idiots

For one, their math is not based in reality. These are numbers pulled out of their asses, with no backing as to if they are correct. However even if there is some truth, you run in to the fact that most people are using LCDs (and more convert all the time) and most LCDs are backwards. All LCDs run their backlights on full (or rather at the full level the user sets) at all times they are displaying. They work by blocking light. Well, the most common form of LCDs, the Twisted Nematic, are open by default. That is to say when there's no current across the junction, they pass the maximum amount of light. As such to turn black they need full power applied to the junction. They actually use more power to do black then white. There are LCDs that do not work this way (IPS and VA variants) but they are by far the minority on computer displays.

So a "Blackle" would increase power usage on LCD systems, which needs to be factored in.

If these people really care about saving energy, maybe they'd look to things like old, inefficient air conditioning units. ACs use power like no other appliance in a normal home. However there are many different quality levels out there. Good modern ones can move a lot more heat per unit of energy input. This is generally measured in a term called SEER, which means how many Btus of cooling a unit does per watt-hour of energy input. For old units SEER values of 9 or less are common. These days, you can't get less than 13 (by law) and you can get them over 20 SEER. That means that you'll be talking about a unit roughly twice as efficient at cooling. That is some major, major energy savings right there. Doesn't take a lot of that to equal their theoretical Google numbers, and this is backed up by reality.

Re:The most frustrating thing is....

"As for Fujitsu's 0W-standby monitor, they conveniently omit the fact that this extra relay's coil and related components will be drawing an extra 1W or so while the monitor/TV is on."

1 Watt??? I built a circuit that used a relay for precisely this. I just called it from the other point of view, it turned itself off. There is no way you need 1 Watt of power to hold anything but the largest relays.

Btw - this 0W standby only works when its a relatively simple thing to monitor for to come out of standby, a line level. Try making a TV that is 0W standby, yet I can boot it with just my remote. Actually, its quite simple, you use a rechargeable battery to power a IR monitoring circuit, but thats cheating :)

Re:8% sounds high

No one is telling you to go out and buy one right away or we're all goners. It's just another option to consider when your current model fails. The same goes for the rest of that saving the planet stuff.

Re:patents?!?!

I built a relay and cap circuit when I was in highschool to turn AC circuits on and off with a standard momentary push button. The result, zero stand-by current. holding the momentary switch completed a circuit which would cascade and latch a larger relay. This relay would hold itself closed until you interrupted the power. Simple, and makes a satisfying click.

I'm not sure how you can patent something that 1-2% of EE students discovered on their own.