Is it true that tv's, computers, vcr's, cell ph chargers & other appliances still use more power when turned off or not in use than when they are turned on or in use??

No, it is not true.

No. It is true that many of these still use some power when plugged in but not in use. Not more

no it is not true the power meter lies to you about energy used is all (sarcasm) there is a extremly small amount of energy that goes out into the wire and this is the so called phantom load. Other things have sleep modes which are just low power states and not really off. things like games systems, television, and anything with a digital clock that you are not setting every time you turn it on draw power to keep time accurate.

It depends on how long it's "off" and how long it is "on". If it's off for 23 hours and on for 1 hour, then it could be true that it uses more energy during the 23 hours that it is off than the 1 hour that it is on. Now if you compare the amount of energy consumed for 1 hour of off time vs one hour of on time, then it will certainly use more energy while on then when off. It's just the energy control freaks twisting things to sound worse than they really are.

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When off, most standby devices consume 5..20W. Only very modern "power saving" devices have a standby power of 2W or less. What they use when fully on depends on the device.

For example, my largest (and pretty ancient) TV consumes 20W when in standby and 180W when on. 9 hours off consumes as much energy as 1 hour on. If I watch 2 hours or less in average per day, the stand by time consumes more energy than the time I watch TV.

quote:

eeanle wrote:
Is it true that tv's, computers, vcr's, cell ph chargers & other appliances still use more power when turned off or not in use than when they are turned on or in use??

More power? No. More energy? Possibly.

Energy = Power × Time

If the ratio of off-time to on-time is greater than the ratio of operating power to standby power, then yes, statistically speaking, the TV is using more energy turned off than turned on.

Imagine a TV that takes 10 Watts when turned off, 100 Watts when turned on; and in an average day, it’s turned off for 22 hours and on for 2 hours.

Time off = 22 h
Time on = 2 h
Ratio = 22 h ÷ 2 h = 11:1

Operating power = 100 W
Standby power = 10 W
Ratio = 100 W ÷ 10 W = 10:1

Energy used when turned off = 22 h × 10 W = 220 Wh
Energy used when turned on = 2 h × 100 W = 200 Wh

I kind of wish they had done some testing on these types of devices when they tested the lights on/off myth. Certainly turning it off for several hours is better than leaving it on, but what about turning it off for 5 or 10 minutes then turning it back on? Would that take anymore electricity? I never heard of lights taking more electricity to start, but I did hear that TVs and monitors did. I think that the old style TVs and monitors would take more to startup than the new ones, so that argument probably isn't very valid anymore, if it was even valid in the first place.

And along those lines, how many times could a monitors power button be used. When I was in school, I had a computer class at the end of the day, and we would always have to turn the computers off. They told us not to turn the monitors off, but to leave them in standy because the cost of the electricy they used in standby would be very little, but the power button would wear out quickly if we turned it off everyday. I thought that was total BS.

They could also test how much electricity a computer uses while off, during startup, in standy, and on, but not working. Of course different components in different computers could make a difference, but we could get a general idea.

Turning on a device will consume a bit more power since capacitors have to be charged. But that's only for a split second and not more than twice the energy consumption. If the split second for starting would consume more energy than 5 minutes of operation time, the wires would start smoking!

Older TVs do in fact use some extra energy after turning them on, they use a large coil to degauss the CRT. It depends on the TV but that's somewhere about 200W for less than 2 seconds. But a TV only degausses the CRT when turning on the mains, not when activating it from stand-by.

Misplaced post. Disregard.