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power consumption of total components

Good day guys. I recently moved. My audio system is still boxed as I haven't done the basement renovation yet. My question concerns your rigs total electric consumption in dollars.
 My new house is not all that different from my older home. It has two heat pumps for the A/C. The new house was built in 2008. The old house in 1988. I am amazed at how much lower the electric bills are in my new place. I do have gas heat in the new house. However, my electric bill is less than 1/3 the amount of the old house. We keep the house comfortable. I live in Pennsylvania. My most recent electric bill is $149.00 for the past month. The old house would have been $450.00 or so. (The heat pumps in the old house were replaced in 2015)  The only thing not in the equation is my audio system. I did search the forums here. I see there have been discussions on how to calculate how much energy your system is using. I haven't seen any postings on actual dollar amounts. Who knows within 10 % how much your rig is costing per month?
128x128jnovak
erik_squires
16,173 posts
 
Easiest and most accurate way is to put one of these in (or similar):

https://amzn.to/3i6OHW8

Measure it for a week, then you'll have your answer of watt hours. :)


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three_easy_payments's avatar
three_easy_payments
2,097 posts
 
@erik_squires   That's exactly the meter I use.  It even lets you input the rate from your service provider.  No calcs needed!
kijanki's avatar
kijanki
4,428 posts
 
My Benchmark AHB2 consumes 0.5W at standby, 20W at idle and varying amount during use.  Music power is usually very low, but it depends on type of music.  The highest would be for playing sinewaves.  After that probably organ or heavy classical pieces.  On the other end would be a Jazz trio.  Music power is very low because half of the peak loudness is 10% of peak power and in addition music has gaps.  Class A is different story consuming huge amount of power all the time.

Ignoring miniscule standby or idle (because something always plays - music or TV) a listen for about 6 hrs a day = 180 hrs a month.  They charge me $0.14 per kWh.  Assuming 50W power draw it will make 
0.05kW x 180hrs x $0.14 = $1.25 a month.  If you listen loud it will be likely twice that.  With your system in my room it would be  about $12 a month for 5 hour a day listening, not counting idle and standby for the rest of the day.  When calculating energy cost remember that they charge for energy and delivery, in my case $0.07 + $0.07 = $0.14 per kWh.
builder3
758 posts
 
Your new house is better insulated, and undoubtedly more energy efficient in every way. Don’t blame your sound system, in the grand scheme of things, most use very little power. The two big draws are heating/cooling, and the water heater. The way to lessen this is better insulation, and more efficient appliances.
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