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Hi Fi and household energy use - some answers and discussion

How much power does the hi fi use?

Others have discussed this below but here is a summary:
Most of the power to hi fi equipment shows up as heat so items that give off lots of heat use lots of power.
The power amplifier is usually the component that uses the most heat whether it is a separate component or it is part of an integrated amp or a receiver.
Some equipment lists its standby power use or you can measure it. See also Mark Kelly's posts.

What about the Rotel?

Your Rotel will use far less than 300W on average because like most amplifiers, it is class A/B, not class A. It might briefly use 300W if you were trying to use the hi fi system to remove the windows from the room but in normal use or when the system is on but the sound is off, usage will be far less.

What effect does this have on household energy use?

The effect on household energy use is not as simple as just looking at the power consumption of the hi fi (or any other appliance), you need to look at the net effect and that usually varies depending upon the time of year and the heating (and any cooling) systems you have. So if a hifi system is left on and for simplicity we assume that the hifi itself uses 100W on average:

In summer in the UK you probably have the heat off and no air conditioning so a hifi system that uses 100W adds 100W to your household energy consumption. In summer, if you have air conditioning, you might use say 140W on average (100W for the hi fi and 40W extra to cool it)

In winter, if you have the heat on and want to maintain the same room temperature, then switching off 100W of hifi will mean that you have to add an extra 100W of heating by some other means. If you have electric heat in the room, it will be a straight trade off. If you have a heat pump it might use say 35W of electricity to provide 100W of heat. If you use wood gas or coal, the amount of heat you will have to generate to deliver 100W will be more than 100W and will depend upon the efficiency of your heating system.

The above examples are themselves simplified but they should help give a general idea.

David




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