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oladulce
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Satellite radio in a solar powered casa
I'm shopping for a home theater set up for our solar casa and every watt counts. I was shocked to learn the receivers I liked use a huge amount of
electricity- Denons use 670 watts and an Onkyo is a whopping 878 watts!
Back to the computer chair for many more hours, and I found a full-featured Yamaha 7 channel receiver that only uses 270 watts which will be great for
evening dvd viewing.
But 270 watts/hr is quite a bit if the receiver is on for several hours of satellite radio listening and I'm trying to figure out if there's a better
way to get the Sirius radio without connecting it thru the stereo receiver.
Anyone every put a Kill-o-watt meter on a Sirius "boombox" speaker/dock? Anybody have one of these, or heard how they sound? Siruis XSABB2
http://www.crutchfield.com/p_220SXABB2/SiriusXM-Portable-Spe...
Any suggestions how to get decent sounding home sat radio without using a ton of power? A separate, lower power use receiver and speakers just for the
sat radio? The boombox/dock thing?
The Energy Star website was hacked is currently out of order so unfortunately so i can't easily research what the lowest watt requiring stereo
receivers are and I don't know if any go below 200watts anyway.
I'm all ears if you have any ideas.
[Edited on 12-2-2013 by oladulce]
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Hook
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I have an integrated Onkyo amp that I use in one of my audio setups, so I know you must be into good, clean sounding audio. But I am on the grid. I'd
love to find an old Onkyo tuner to go with this. Just havent looked around much.
Two options you might consider.
What about a set of Bose "computer speakers"? I havent heard this set but I have an older MediaMate set that sound just great and they draw 1.2a @ 12V AC, not
DC. Maybe these new versions draw even less.
Now, while I have my sat radio going into my Onkyo, I also have the ability to send it to an FM transmitter that I got off elecsky.com. Here is a
similar product. Takes a mic or line level input, has an input volume control for each and re-transmits the audio signal for about a half mile. You then
tune in your audio source with any FM receiver/radio you have. This is obviously lower audio quality but it is very versatile for me as I like to move
around my 1/4 acre lot, listening to, well, MLB baseball, of course; THOUGH LISTENING TO THE ANGELS IS GETTING MADDENING! Maybe a simple, cheap boom
box will be all you need. ANY radio in the house can get the audio.
The transmitter actually runs on 12vDC, so I even take it on my extended road trips to re-transmit audio from my truck camper. Just bring a basic FM
radio outside and I'm set.
I actually considered getting one that broadcast at 2 watts (mine is 0.5 watts TRANSMITTING power) and would pretty much cover all of the town I live
in. I could drive around and listen to baseball anywhere I went. Really pretty safe in Mexico where there are lots of available frequencies on the FM
band to re-transmit a signal. Probably illegal, too, of course. But I doubt there are roving crews of technicians looking for pirate radio stations in
Mexico.
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KaceyJ
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We have the speaker dock. For news /speech it's sound is adequate but has more or less no audio quality at all. I measured a 6 watt/.11 amps draw on
it .
What we do is hook it up to an older Yamaha receiver with a couple of good size bookshelf speakers and it sounds pretty good. It then uses 30 watts
/.35amps at a comfortable listening volume.
In the RV, it gets hooked to a 7.1 surround sound system and sounds awsome, but I don't know the power usage on that which should be considerably more
with the thumper etc.
Hope this helps
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oladulce
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Thanks Hook. The computer speaker option is something to think about if we set up a separate audio system for sat radio.
I have an old model Delphi Roady XM car radio and we've been using and even older portable boombox radio to pick up and play the FM signal. But we
just moved in to the new house and noticed that when the ceiling recessed lights are on (which have dimmers and LED bulbs), the boombox has so much
static noise you can't hear the radio. We don't know if it's the dimmers, or the bulbs, or what is actually causing causing the interference with the
FM signal, but it only seems to happen when these certain lights are on. Unfortunately, these lights are in the main living area where the radio
equipment will be located.
I don't know enough about this stuff to troubleshoot, but we definitely don't want to change out the lights, bulbs, or dimmer switches so I was
trying to find a way to directly plug in the sat radio equipment to each other rather than transmitting the signal over FM in case that's the problem.
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oladulce
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| Quote: | Originally posted by KaceyJ
We have the speaker dock. For news /speech it's sound is adequate but has more or less no audio quality at all. I measured a 6 watt/.11 amps draw on
it .
What we do is hook it up to an older Yamaha receiver with a couple of good size bookshelf speakers and it sounds pretty good. It then uses 30 watts
/.35amps at a comfortable listening volume.
In the RV, it gets hooked to a 7.1 surround sound system and sounds awsome, but I don't know the power usage on that which should be considerably more
with the thumper etc.
Hope this helps |
Great info and it definitely helps. I'll avoid the sirius boombox- we're not audiophiles but listen to sat radio exclusively for the music and would
like it to sound decent.
Also good to know your 1st hand stereo receiver power info. I'll delve further in to simple stereo receiver's power consumption. 30 watts is
definitely do-able vs using the power guzzler home theater receiver.Having a separate receiver for sat radio might be the best way to go.
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monoloco
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We have a set of these:
http://audioengineusa.com/Store/Audioengine-A5
They sound great and require no other components.
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rts551
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I am no electronics expert, but I think the wattage is at max volume. using a Killowatt measuring device, my Onkyo only measure 1.5 amps at
moderate sound levels.
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Bruce R Leech
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Mood: A lot cooler than Mulege
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| Quote: | Originally posted by rts551
I am no electronics expert, but I think the wattage is at max volume. using a Killowatt measuring device, my Onkyo only measure 1.5 amps at
moderate sound levels. |
that is right keep it at low volume and it wont use much juice, also turn off your sub and you will save more.
Bruce R Leech
Ensenada
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Bob and Susan
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oladulce...are you sure you are talking about 120v wattage use or 12v or 19v 24v
its hard to think you need 870 watts of POWER to run a stereo
or is the wattage the form of measurement they use to rate speakers
not really electricity usage
I would measure a "real" unit with your meter to actually see what it uses
my coffee pot uses 700watts and it BOILS water
[Edited on 5-3-2013 by Bob and Susan]
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oladulce
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| Quote: | Originally posted by Bob and Susan
oladulce...are you sure you are talking about 120v wattage use or 12v or 19v 24v
its hard to think you need 870 watts of POWER to run a stereo
or is the wattage the form of measurement they use to rate speakers
not really electricity usage
I would measure a "real" unit with your meter to actually see what it uses
my coffee pot uses 700watts and it BOILS water
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That's why we were so surprised Bob, it's the actual power consumption of the receivers that runs 600-800 watts on some models. The info came from a
Crutchfield advisor and the Onkyo info was on an audiophile product review website that listed power consumption as one of their review criteria. I'm
sure you know that it's nearly impossible to get the energy consumption info from any manufactures- for some reason they rarely include it in there
product specs.
The power hungry receivers were 7 channel/"100 watt's per channel" models, but I eventually found the Yamaha ( which uses only 270 watts of power) and
it's also 7 channels/"85 watts per channel" and there are some similar Sony's that only require 240 watts to run the units??? Alot of the same bells
and whistles so I wonder if some are just less efficient or something.
I'm going to get the Yamaha and I'll check it with the meter and see what it draws.
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oladulce
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We'll go with the Audioengine5's and a Sirius "dock and play with a home kit"- thanks Monoloco! They'll work great for sat radio and ipod music and
we'll use the Yamaha receiver for DVD viewing only. I didn't realize that the volume can impact power consumption and even tho some of us don't hear
as well as we used to, we're never up full blast and we're not using a subwoofer so thanks for that info too.
[Edited on 5-3-2013 by oladulce]
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LancairDriver
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Here's a handy, simple to use device that will tell you everything you need to know about the power usage of your appliances.
http://p3international.com/products/special/P4400/P4400-CE.h...
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rts551
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If you don't already have one. Get one. They are essential for living OFF GRID.
http://www.p3international.com/products/special/p4400/p4400-...
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comitan
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oladulce
Im in La Paz very seldom use mine, use could borrow it next time in La Paz.
Strive For The Ideal, But Deal With What\'s Real.
Every day is a new day, better than the day before.(from some song)
Lord, Keep your arm around my shoulder and your hand over my mouth.
“The sincere pursuit of truth requires you to entertain the possibility that everything you believe to be true may in fact be false”
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oladulce
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The Kill-o-watt meter gets alot of use around here. I'm ordering stuff online from Baja Sur that we pick up on our next trip nob, I often haven't had
access to the power draw info of many electronics and appliance as I've outfitted the casa. Most manufacturers don't have the info when you call them.
I usually go to the Energy Star website first to narrow down the models to the most energy efficient of whatever I'm shopping for. But the energy Star
site is down after they had a cyber attack so I'm relying on "nomad stars".
Thanks for the offer Comitan.
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monoloco
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I just measured the Audio Engines with my Kill o Watt meter, it's drawing 12 watts at the volume that I normally listen, going to 20 watts at window
rattling volume.
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Bob and Susan
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that's a HUGE difference from 878 watts
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monoloco
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Just for reference, the audio engine speakers are rated at 50 watts RMS per channel, that equates to only 25 watts of electrical draw at ear splitting
levels, so it looks to me like you can figure that the maximum power draw of an audio amplifier is somewhere around 25% of the rated RMS power of an
amplifier. Often audio equipment is rated at peak power which is quite a bit higher than RMS power output, so just because an amplifier is rated at
600-800 watts, the actual power output or RMS power could be considerably less. Depending on how the power is rated, that 600 watt amplifier could
actually draw 100 watts or less at full power.
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Bob and Susan
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there is the REAL answer
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willardguy
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just the fact that you would suggest this ridiculous term "rms watt" is used to describe the power output of an amplifier tells me you studied at the
university of radio shack!
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