[rescue] Prices... Amazing

[Charles Shannon Hendrix]

Phil Stracchino wrote:
> Charles Shannon Hendrix wrote:
> 
>>However, I have meastured a pair of PCs with a meter and when drawing
>>the same current, one of them output a hell of a lot more heat.
>>
>>No, I don't think the laws of thermodynamics were taking a day off.
>>
>>But still... how does one explain that?
> 
> 
> Well, there's such a thing as power factors (though granted, it usually
> applies to large inductive loads, and I don't know whether computer
> power supplies in this class qualify).  Power *draw* does not
> necessarily equal power *dissipation*.

I know, I was just being a little bit cheeky.

It is true that the energy has to go somewhere, it's just a bad 
assumption to believe it all leaves as heat, or that even if it does, it 
will feel exactly the same.

There are factors like conductive cooling that might be different, not 
all power supplies can use all they draw, and all kinds of other 
differences.  I don't know how much power supply efficiency affects 
things, but I imagine it will be significant.