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The Graveyard - Products No Longer Supported => D-Link Storage => DNS-321 => Topic started by: tone21705 on May 30, 2009, 06:24:25 PM

Title: how much does it cost to run the dns321 for a month?
Post by: tone21705 on May 30, 2009, 06:24:25 PM

I was wondering what the cost, leaving it on 24/7 for a month is?

My electricity provider sells me a kwhr for 12 cents.

I am using a 1.5TB Seagate HD 'cuda

http://www.frys.com/product/5803213?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG

Firmware 1.01 (so the fan is running constantly)

Thanks!

Title: Re: how much does it cost to run the dns321 for a month?
Post by: fmaxwell on June 01, 2009, 12:22:29 PM

It will vary depending on what the unit is doing.  If the drive is in sleep mode most of the time, then the cost is lower.  If it's being thrashed by use 24/7 as a media server or being read-from and written-to a lot of the time, then the cost is higher.

I would recommend using the beta firmware that does not leave the fan running all of the time.  Fans have a limited life span and you are using your fan's life span up.

Title: Re: how much does it cost to run the dns321 for a month?
Post by: Dad Man Walking on June 01, 2009, 10:15:56 PM

I used a Kill-A-Watt meter to evaluate this very question.   (http://www.p3international.com/products/special/P4400/P4400-CE.html (http://www.p3international.com/products/special/P4400/P4400-CE.html))

My 321 has two Seagate 1.5TB drives in RAID-1.  It is running the 1.02b5 beta firmware and the fans shut down as they should.

At standby, my unit draws 8 watts.  Running with both drives cycling I measured 25 watts.  Not sure if the fans were running, that would not add that much so let's ignore that for now.

If I did the math correctly, you would be paying about $2.16/month if the unit was active with the drives cycling 24/7, and $0.69/month if the unit was on standby for the whole month.  So your actual cost will be somewhere between those numbers, depending on how hard you are running the system.  It might draw a bit more power when spinning the drives up, and there is probably some "worst case" cycling frequency where the drives are consuming more energy spinning up than they are saving by idling in standby...

...let's see...e to the x, dx, dy...oh heck, forget about that.  Somewhere between one and two bucks per month...is that close enough for you?

Title: Re: how much does it cost to run the dns321 for a month?
Post by: ECF on June 02, 2009, 09:05:07 AM

Wow like 2 bucks thats awesome to know. I always kinda wondered, thats like chump change. Alot less then running a PC 24/7

Title: Re: how much does it cost to run the dns321 for a month?
Post by: tone21705 on June 02, 2009, 10:42:29 AM

thanks for the info, great to know.

I upgraded to the beta firmware, and have a dns321 that actually goes to sleep.

Title: Re: how much does it cost to run the dns321 for a month?
Post by: Dad Man Walking on June 02, 2009, 10:08:33 PM

Quote from: ECF on June 02, 2009, 09:05:07 AM

Wow like 2 bucks thats awesome to know. I always kinda wondered, thats like chump change. Alot less then running a PC 24/7

Yeah, PC's are way more expensive.  If they are running full-time (no wake-on-LAN enabled) they can be 80, 100, even 120 watts depending what you've got inside of them.  And assuming no monitor.  At 100 watts, the OP would be paying over $8/month, and over $100/year, to run the server.

And that's with cheap electricity.  In California, land of absurd electricity rates, my blended rate is $0.26/KwH (over twice what the OP pays). But worse...with tiered pricing, my marginal rate is $0.44 cents/KwH.  So when I look at choice between running a PC or running a NAS, I'm looking at almost $400/year to run a PC server vs. maybe $40 to run a NAS (if I keep it on all of the time).  Makes it worth sweating out little firmware problems, doesn't it?

Title: Re: how much does it cost to run the dns321 for a month?
Post by: tone21705 on June 03, 2009, 01:14:27 AM

I'm in Southern California, and if you are paying that much for electricity, you might want to look into:

http://www.sce.com/residential/income-qualified/CAREFERA/care-fera-rate-programs.htm?from=careandfera

Everyone just lies on it anyways...

Title: Re: how much does it cost to run the dns321 for a month?
Post by: TheWitness on June 28, 2009, 12:23:44 PM

Here's a nice link:

http://www.csgnetwork.com/elecenergycalcs.html

TheWitness