P3 International P4400 Kill A Watt Electricity Usage Monitor
by P3 INTERNATIONAL
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List Price: Our Price: $14.99 You Save: $15.00 (50%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Tools See more product details |
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Tools and Hardware Reviews of P3 International P4400 Kill A Watt Electricity Usage Monitor
Customer Review: The first step on the path to green
Summary: 5 Stars
Simple machines are often the most useful, and the Kill-A-Watt is a good example. It does only two things; it reports the instantaneous power use of whatever is plugged into it, and it time-integrates the power use to give you a running total of the energy used, measured in kilowatt-hours. It also reports volts and amps, but if you care about those measurements, you probably want a general purpose digital multimeter. As the name suggests the Kill-A-Watt is ideally suited for hunting down energy waste in your house.
Think of it like a tape measure, but for electricity. When you buy a new fridge, you ought to use a tape measure to find out whether it will fit in your kitchen, or through your front door. The Kill-A-Watt will tell you if it fits in your energy budget. There are much fancier tools, but unless you are doing sophisticated engineering or laboratory work, you don't need them.
If you want to reduce your electricity use, the first thing you should probably do is buy a bulk box of compact florescent bulbs. Replace each of your incandescent bulbs as they burn out. When there are only a few incandescent bulbs left, take them out and store them as emergency spares. IKEA sells CFLs in different sizes, shapes and tints for reasonable prices.
Once you've maxed out on CFLs, it takes a little creativity to find opportunities to save electricity. For example, would it be more worthwhile to replace your refrigerator or your washing machine? How much electricity does your computer actually use? What about "phantom" load?
It's often difficult or impossible to make these assessments from the specifications of the devices themselves. The electricity used by a computer depends on how the OS is configured and how the computer is used. Electricity consumption of a refrigerator depends on the temperature, humidity and altitude of your kitchen. And so on. Also, as some devices wear out, they draw more power.
The Kill-A-Watt takes the guesswork out of this process. You interpose it between the wall socket and the device you want to measure, and it will tell you the instantaneous power use. Leave it plugged in for a while, and it will add up the total power over a period of time. It's dead simple to use. You plug it in and it does its thing.
One thing the Kill-A-Watt won't tell you is how much the energy costs. This is the main complaint of the reviewers who did not give the Kill-A-Watt a five star rating. They seem demand that it measure electricity in dollars and cents instead of kilowatt-hours. This is actually a very silly thing to want. Not only are utility rates very different in different parts of the country (and world), but many people have tiered service. They pay one rate for the first X kilowatt-hours, another rate for the next X, and another rate for the next X after that, et cetera. Other customers pay different utility rates depending on the time of day. Some people have both tiered and time-of-day metering.
If you want to assign a dollar value to the energy used by a single device, which rate would you use? It is possible calculate, but it would not be especially useful information. What you really care about is the devices contribution to the total. For example, if you measure that your old VCR contributes five kilowatt-hours to your monthly utility bill, and you are four kilowatt-hours over a tier threshold, then it's obvious that you should unplug your VCR.
Cost-calculating features would make the device much more complicated to use. It's much easier to reason out the cost on your own than it would be to program in your rate structure. Making guesses and conjectures about the rate structure would give you bad data, and would defeat the whole purpose of measuring things in the first place. As it is, the Kill-A-Watt is blessedly simple to use.
This is a fantastic little device. Every homeowner and apartment dweller should have one. I have only two complaints :
[1] It tends to block both plugs on a standard size outlet. If this bothers you, use an extension cable.
[2] It has a dorky name.
Customer Review: Brings your purchases into reality
Summary: 5 Stars
Our summer electric bill at my old home (built in the 80's) located in So Ca. hovered over $800 a MONTH! EEK! Our new home with it's enhanced insulation and double pane glass though double the size averages around $450.00 per month. Still, with gas prices and a new baby I figured this would be a pretty good time to see if I could save further as well as make a difference for the environment.
Basically this unit plugs into a power outlet and whatever electrical device you want to meter plugs into this unit. The results are immediate. Keep in mind though that this will not calculate the actual cost of the electricity being used, only the amount of electricity being used and then you will have to use the going rate off your power bill to calculate the cost.
The unit works great though I would recommend an extension cord to plug into at times as it can be a tad difficult to read in tight places as the screen does not light up.
I suppose I could be considered a techno nut with all of the latest in gadgets and so I decided to start there as I hear and read so much of wasted electricity going to electronic devices that are turned off.
So what did I find?
All of these were tested while OFF.
The Klipse Ipod kitchen unit uses 12watts.
32" LCD office tv uses 15watts.
27" LCD Xbox 360 monitor (12watts)
50" HD Panasonic plasma(9 watts)
60" HD Sony LED TV (8 watts)
30" Dell computer monitor (0 watts!)
22" garage LCD tv (5watts)
42" downstairs plasma (11watts)
Again, be mindful that the above is pulling power when switched off. A little surprising for sure and all of them are listed as Energy Star! I have other electronics such as a few more monitors in the house that I do not use often and so I simply put them on a switch where I turned them off.
Though I would not call it fun, it is interesting to check the electrical pull of various items throughout the house and one finds themselves running around the house to see what they can plug into next. My aquarium? How about 65 watts of continuous power. Anyone want to come over to have fish for dinner?
The screen readout is very small and difficult to read but is workable. One can switch between volts,watts, Amps per hour,etc.. with just a press of a button.
Unit appears to be built pretty well so no concerns there.
Other readings:
My hi end customer gaming computer rig with the best of everything, 580watts! Eeek! Editing videos is more expensive than I once thought.
My large compressor in the garage (400watts) when on.
50" plasma (355 watts!), Panasonic makes the best plasmas but eat up a lot of juice.
60" Sony TV (198 watts)
My total theater room entertainment center (lights, 60" tv, Denon 3808 A/V receiver , PS3(Blue-Ray), 590watts! EEEK!
The stuff adds up quick.
With this unit I was able to reduce my summer average bill by $29.00 a month without any sacrifice in my quality of living by simply unplugging devices that are seldom used. Now of course TV's are difficult at this as you would have to input the new settings each time. But other devices can simply be unplugged to save a bit of money and help out the environment though yes I agree I use a bit more than the average person I suppose.
This is also a good device to compare various items if shopping.
I would highly recommend this unit to everyone and can say that it has paid for itself in just the first month by reducing wasted power consumption in my house.
Customer Review: Great Gadget, Excellent for for Monitoring Energy Usage
Summary: 5 Stars
There were two primary reasons that I purchased the Kill-A-Watt: 1) to measure the [questionable] energy savings performance of the Power Planner by Energy Smart (see review) 2) to disprove the stated 2900 Watts on my Bellissima Ionic Volcano Hair Dryer (see review). Tertiary reasons included a general interest in energy savings. As it turns out, the Kill-A-Watt demonstrated that both aforementioned devices did not live up to stated manufacturer claims.
The Kill-A-Watt plugs into any typical grounded three-prong receptacle. It also has a receptacle so it acts as a splice, presumably measuring voltage and current to determine power in watts (ohm's law V=IR, Power=VI). In addition to measuring power, voltage and current in real-time, it can also measure kilowatt hours (kwh), via an imbedded timer. This unit, kwh, is the measure by which your electric utility company bills you.
In general, the Kill-A-Watt is extremely easy to use. There is a large LCD display indicating the value of interest. The digital readout and buttons make it extremely easy to navigate through the various functions.
Particularly interesting is observing the difference between the stated wattages and realized wattages of various consumer devices. It is also interesting to watch the energy creep caused by thermal factors (in p=ir^2). FYI, for typical resistive elements "R" goes up as temperature increases.
As you can see, the Kill-A-Watt allowed me to disprove various manufacturer claims.
Measured Wattages:
Belissma 2900 Watt Hair Dryer
Ionic Hair Dryer (aka Volcano) ...1525 Watts
ConAir
Hair Made
Andis ProStyle
Other Consumer Devices:
Heated Towel Warmer (stated 100 watts)....... 131
Lights:
Sunbox Sunray Full Spectrum Lightbox (stated 120 watts)....123 watts
Lights of America Fluorex Outdoor Lamp (stated 65 watts).....65 watts
Lightwitz 30 watt light bulb..... 30 watts
Lights of America 200 Watt Equivalent Compact Fluorescent (stated 42 watts)....45 Watts
It is important to note that the Power Planner by EnergySmart was intended to save money on devices with older electric motors. In my review of the Power Planner, I outlined the test results using the device on my parents 40+ year old secondary refrigerator. Sadly, the Kill-A-Watt showed that there was no realized difference using the Power Planner over multiple 24 hour periods.
If you have any interest in energy conservation/savings or are questioning manufacturer claims, I would highly recommend that you purchase the Kill-A-Watt. It is great for measuring instantaneous power, current and voltage, but also power consumption over a period of time.
Customer Review: I LOVE This Gadget, Great for Monitoring Energy Usage
Summary: 5 Stars
There were two primary reasons that I purchased the Kill-A-Watt: 1) to measure the [questionable] energy savings performance of the Power Planner by Energy Smart (see review) 2) to disprove the stated 2900 Watts on my Bellissima Ionic Volcano Hair Dryer (see review). Tertiary reasons included a general interest in energy savings. As it turns out, the Kill-A-Watt demonstrated that both aforementioned devices did not live up to stated manufacturer claims.
The Kill-A-Watt plugs into any typical grounded three-prong receptacle. It also has a receptacle so it acts as a splice, presumably measuring voltage and current to determine power in watts (ohm's law V=IR, Power=VI). In addition to measuring power, voltage and current in real-time, it can also measure kilowatt hours (kwh), via an imbedded timer. This unit, kwh, is the measure by which your electric utility company bills you.
In general, the Kill-A-Watt is extremely easy to use. There is a large LCD display indicating the value of interest. The digital readout and buttons make it extremely easy to navigate through the various functions.
Particularly interesting is observing the difference between the stated wattages and realized wattages of various consumer devices. It is also interesting to watch the energy creep caused by thermal factors (in p=ir^2). FYI, for typical resistive elements "R" goes up as temperature increases.
As you can see, the Kill-A-Watt allowed me to disprove various manufacturer claims.
Measured Wattages:
Belissma 2900 Watt Hair Dryer
Ionic Hair Dryer (aka Volcano) ...1525 Watts
ConAir
Hair Made
Andis ProStyle
Other Consumer Devices:
Heated Towel Warmer (stated 100 watts)....... 131
Lights:
Sunbox Sunray Full Spectrum Lightbox (stated 120 watts)....123 watts
Lights of America Fluorex Outdoor Lamp (stated 65 watts).....65 watts
Lightwitz 30 watt light bulb..... 30 watts
Lights of America 200 Watt Equivalent Compact Fluorescent (stated 42 watts)....45 Watts
It is important to note that the Power Planner by EnergySmart was intended to save money on devices with older electric motors. In my review of the Power Planner, I outlined the test results using the device on my parents 40+ year old secondary refrigerator. Sadly, the Kill-A-Watt showed that there was no realized difference using the Power Planner over multiple 24 hour periods.
If you have any interest in energy conservation/savings or are questioning manufacturer claims, I would highly recommend that you purchase the Kill-A-Watt. It is great for measuring instantaneous power, current and voltage, but also power consumption over a period of time.
Customer Review: You need this.
Summary: 5 Stars
Love it!! Awesome simple little device. Opens your eyes to many things we take for granted. Electric bill was way too high and kept getting higher. Called electric company and told them to do actual reading not estimated usage. Still was high. Got this device and began connecting everything to it and was shocked. So many things that we think is off is constantly drawing power. With this device and now using better energy habits, like putting things on power strips with on/off switches, helped reduce Kwh down 50%. Cable box uses 13W while off. Same with my audio system. Just displaying the clock on the audio system while off was using bloody 22W!!
Using the specs on the back of most items just lists the max input values but really they don't use it all. My cable modem which I thought was 60W (Label said 0.5A at 120V) was really using 3W.
I even switched all my appliances to different switches on my house and turned off extra switches not really being used. I have 6 switches and currently just using 3 now. Sad thing is I found that one switch has like 80% of all electrical power. Really bad installation IMO. Lucky all appliances just use 9A on this 15A switch.
I was originally planning on building one of these devices myself since I found plans with all the specs to build one. But in reality, you need to buy all the parts mostly in bulk so it will come out more than if you have all the parts lying around. I was even considering making a real dangerous and cheap one buy splicing a power cord, attaching a resistor and connecting it to my multimeter, but for $23 was worth not putting my life and my components at risk. About the design yes really dumb if you connect it directly to the wall. USE A POWER CABLE for that. Like those AC power cables should be fine.
Some findings-
Switch light bulbs from incandescent to fluorescent: 535W down to 143W
Computer and Monitor will be shutoff at power strip when not used. Saving 5W
Keep Printer, USB Hub, HDD enclosure, Wireless AP on separate power strip and only turn on when needed. Saving 9W
I even made an Excel sheets with all values, made charts and mapped switches in the house. If you love playing with numbers this is gonna be addicting.