The Electrical Usage So Far This Summer For Linux Benchmarking

Written by Michael Larabel in Hardware on 13 August 2016 at 08:00 PM EDT. 42 Comments
HARDWARE
It's been a number of months since providing any glimpse at my power bill for the electrical cost of so much Linux benchmarking that happens constantly here for Phoronix, OpenBenchmarking.org, LinuxBenchmarking.com, etc. From reader requests, here's a look at how the power use is looking this summer after trying to make some optimizations a few months back.

The power use for this year is the same if not higher than this time last year. Here's my latest electrical bill as of last week:


Still continuing to pull around 3000 kWh per month due to the number of systems running daily for Linux open-source benchmarking and then the air conditioning costs during the summer months.

The reader requests came from wanting a follow-up about my plan this spring of changing the flooring in the benchmarking server room in an effort to help dissipate some heat. Well, it looks like that ultimately didn't do much good given the same power use as last year... But at least the server room flooring looks much better now and also makes the wife happier as an added benefit.


For those new to Phoronix, see A One Year Redux On The Basement Computer Room For Benchmarking 50+ Systems Daily.

I guess my next investment will be hopefully adding solar panels within a few years to help offset the electrical costs of all the power hungry Linux systems. Any other ideas or questions? Feel free to share via commenting in the forums or on Twitter.
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About The Author
Michael Larabel

Michael Larabel is the principal author of Phoronix.com and founded the site in 2004 with a focus on enriching the Linux hardware experience. Michael has written more than 20,000 articles covering the state of Linux hardware support, Linux performance, graphics drivers, and other topics. Michael is also the lead developer of the Phoronix Test Suite, Phoromatic, and OpenBenchmarking.org automated benchmarking software. He can be followed via Twitter, LinkedIn, or contacted via MichaelLarabel.com.

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