Hello 

My question is about the power consumption of the hardware for flight simulation. 

I have a computer that I use only for flight simulation, with a processor: 

Intel Core i9-9900KS 8x4GHz and a GeForce RTX 2080 graphics card. 

Together with the 37 inch 4 K monitor I measured a power consumption of 400 W per hour.
This makes the flight simulation computer the „hungriest power consumer" in my home.

That would makes 4 kWh for a 10 hour flight in real time from Europe to the USA.

Just yesterday I got an electricity price increase from January on - from 28 ct/kWh

to 67 ct/kwh. By changing to another provider I could reduce it to 50 ct/kWh.

I have now the idea to reduce the virtual flying a 2 hour flight per week.

But maybe I exaggerate with the saving....

My questions: 

Can I reduce the electricity consumption of the computer? 

Are rising electricity prices already an issue for you to virtually fly less or shorter distances?  


Translated with DeepL

Edited November 16, 20223 yr by enrico10999

Rather than reduce flying distances could you speed up the sim rate when in the cruise? It would have the same effect.

"speed up the sim rate"

is this possible in MSFS 2020, I only know it from P3D..

Greetings Erik

Also turn down your graphics settings. This should reduce the load on CPU and GPU.

"HWMonitor" software will give you data in real time.

Edited November 16, 20223 yr by hs118

It's not all wasted, that's 400W less heating you need in that room.  Of course if it's hot outside that just means even more load on the aircon.

Yes, you can change the rate. Just needs keys to be defined. Go to Cintrols Options, then Keyboard and put Rate in the Search bt name field to define keys.

Yes you can lower power consumption in cruise, like I do, by setting a hotkey in MSI Afterburner to limit GPU power to 50%. This drops my GPU power consumption from ~300W to ~150W, GPU temp drops below 50C and there is a slight drop in CPU power consumption too. When I am descending, I have another hotkey set to put GPU power back to 100%. 

And there are flight simmers recommending fitting 1000-1500W PSUs how the rich live. 

On 11/17/2022 at 11:43 AM, G-RFRY said:

And there are flight simmers recommending fitting 1000-1500W PSUs how the rich live. 

 

It doesn't matter if you have a 1000, 1500, or 2000 watt PSU. 

A system will only draw the power it needs.

A bigger PSU is about avoiding OCP/OPP tripping due to power spikes and about spending more time at the most efficient part of the power curve.

 

3 hours ago, martin-w said:

 

It doesn't matter if you have a 1000, 1500, or 2000 watt PSU. 

A system will only draw the power it needs.

A bigger PSU is about avoiding OCP/OPP tripping due to power spikes and about spending more time at the most efficient part of the power curve.

 

I'm talking about upgrading when they may not need to, even GN ran a 4090 on an 850w PSU 

PS and the industry are going to need to do something soon, The EU are now looking into this they have strict regs for electrical appliances, and blackouts are expected this winter.   

4 hours ago, G-RFRY said:

I'm talking about upgrading when they may not need to, even GN ran a 4090 on an 850w PSU 

 

 

I recall the conversation was about reducing power consumption in use, not over specifying a PSU. And over specifying a PSU doe not increase power consumption in use.

I recall GN did include an  850 watt in their power spike video tests charts. And I recall they pointed out the need for it to be a high quality PSU.

Its also worth remembering that as a PSU ages and the capacitors wear,  the PSU's output diminishes. And of course the users scenario has to be taken into consideration, in terms of whether they are allowing their board to ignore CPU power limits and whether they are overclocking and by how much. And of course all of the aforementioned might not be manifest when they build or buy their PC's but it could well be in time, especially capacitor wear which is a given. I suspect that many users will have upgraded their graphics cards and made use of older PSU's that aren't generating the output hey did from new.

And of course, there were many reporting issue with power spikes and shut downs with 850 watt PSU's when the 30 series was released. 

The other point is that the price difference between an 850 and 1000 watt PSU isn't huge. 30 to 40 quid I recall. So not really "how the rich live". 

 

Quote

PS and the industry are going to need to do something soon, The EU are now looking into this they have strict regs for electrical appliances, and blackouts are expected this winter. 

 

That's down to efficiency again though, of the entire appliance, how much the components draw, how efficient they are. Not PSU total wattage under max load. Again, the system draws what it needs. If the authorities do look at this it will be total power use of an entire PC.

And if they were to look at just the PSU it would be in terms of gold, silver, platinum ort titanium efficiency ratings. And to be honest, we already have Titanium PSU efficiency right up to 97%. The other point, as this conversation is about power consumption over time, is that by somewhat over specifying a PSU you are running in the middle of the power curve where the unit is most efficient, so actually wasting less power as heat than you would do if you were not somewhat over specified. Its not a huge saving, as modern PSU's now have a flatter curve than they used to.

So no, for a 4090 or 3090, I would not define a 1000 watt PSU as the rich wasting money. 

 

Edited November 27, 20223 yr by martin-w

Also, it is recommended for PSUs to buy one that meets the ATX 3.0 standard which is the newest standard with correct power connectors. See https://www.pcguide.com/psu/atx-30/#:~:text=ATX 3.0 is the new,to 600 watts of power.” for an explanation.

On my really long hauls, i just ALT-ENTER to turn MSFS into a window and minimize it. On nVidia control panel i have set the max framerate for a minimized application to 20fps. This alone saves a TON of energy for when you're doing whatever you have to do while the "simulator simulates" the boring phases of flight which can indeed last for 10h with the A310. Now imagine when PMDG releases the 777 or even Aerosoft with the A330 which should be out first.

Edited November 27, 20223 yr by Nuno Pinto