Q Is anyone working on developing a technology to harness all of the heat generated by PCs, TVs and CE devices and use it to simultaneously heat things like the hot water in a house and cool the devices? - Steve, Dallas

Well we all know energy does not disappear. it transforms. Thus, electricity transformed into heat in AV/computer/network gear is a byproduct of the equipment working and fulfilling its mission. While heat is a waste of useful energy, I’d rather see someone (Intel for example) invent cooler electronics and chipsets, not water heaters that sit on top of racks.

If you recall, a short-lived generation of laptops came out with Pentium 4 processors. The P4 was so hot it needed two huge fans to cool it, so battery life was about one hour or less. Then Intel was pushed to the wall and came out with the energy efficient (and cooler) Centrino platform.

I can imagine writing this email with a cold laptop and 20 hours of battery life in five years.

Good point. So the real question is what can Onkyo do different with its AVR’s, and Dish Network/DirecTV with their DVR’s? It seems like those two components generate 90% of the heat in an average system.

The game will change when smart grid automation products will become common. Once a home user (like me) buys an automation system like C4, and sees the power consumption (and corresponding dollar figures) associated with my DTV box (and LCD TV not being ISF calibrated and lights not being dimmed to 90% and so on…) then pressure will rise to change the programming and equipment we use and have the manufacturers build energy efficient products. So many products are energy guzzlers even in standby or idle mode. There is much improvement to be done.

The enterprise world is already doing this with energy efficient servers, network gear and most importantly, virtualization of desktops and servers.

Why would you want to heat hot water? (sorry, couldn’t resist)

Julie,
Simply take any Carver or Sunfire amp and hook it up to a 4 ohm load. This will heat your water, your home, and give you a beautiful sun tan if you stand only 10” away from it.

Steve,

What if we could invent a “green” rack that uses the house’s cold water supply to silently and cheaply cool down the AV equipment?

Isaac - 06 October 2009 06:51 PM

Good point. So the real question is what can Onkyo do different with its AVR’s, and Dish Network/DirecTV with their DVR’s? It seems like those two components generate 90% of the heat in an average system.