PC wattage and amps

[andree 33]

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Hello , could any one tell me the watts and amps needed for 13 puters. Iam trying to find what we can use for an african school where electricity cuts out 10 times a day! any suggestions welcom

Thank you
crainville@ pacificcoast. net

[wju425]

Welcome to TechIMO!

That's an unusual request. With power outages like that I think you need UPSs and several of them. UPS stands for Uninterupted Power Supply. Maybe someone here has a better idea. They'll be along shortly.

\o/ Billy

[Peeety]

How about a gas generator .... like the hospitals have ..... that kicks in automatically if the power cuts out for any more than a minute..... so that they have a long term Uninteruptable Power Supply (UPS) ..... unlike the standard UPS that only lasts a few minutes ..... giving you just enough time to shut down the system. Of course, you also need a UPS for each system to keep it going till the generator starts up .....

[Bovon]

Amperage at 120 VAC will be (plus or minus) 10 amperes each...that will be somewhere around 120 to 130 amperes total. Since wattage is a function of volts times amperes (P=E X I) the wattage for this kind of setup should be close to 15,000 watts.

[VHockey86]

The average AC current consumptions of a single PC is only going for be a couple amps.

[ArcticFox]

You are asking a difficult question, my friend.

I think there are two ways to find out - first, we need to know every part, model number, and size of all the components in every computer. EVERYTHING.

Or, alternatively, you could buy one of these, a Watts Up? or Watts Up? Pro:
http://www.dom.com/products/wattsup/index.jsp

Slap it on a PC, fire up an intense benchmark, and see what it's sucking. Repeat on all systems. Also, open Notepad so it's a huge span of white (white takes the most power for a CRT, all guns are firing versus a black screen, no guns are firing) and see what the monitor does.

[Bovon]

Quote:

Originally Posted by VHockey86

The average AC current consumptions of a single PC is only going for be a couple amps.

No matter how you cut it, power (in watts) is still equal to volts times amps.

P = E (volts) X I (amps) ~ Watts
P = 120 X 2 = 240 watts (your couple of amps from above).

Somehow.. I don't think so. Any of todays full sized computers consume more than 240 watts.

10 amperes was of course an exaggerated calculation...which good processing of unknowns is always employed. Usually, an engineer will double the amount expected when he (1) does not know exactly what will be used or (2) the equipment will be used in an environment that can allow upgrading in the future.

[ben-the-slacker]

Doesn't that sorta depend on how much power computers suck? The way I learned it in physics, P=I*V (Watts=Amps x Volts). So if you have 13 computers using a 200W psu each with a 80W monitor, and the voltage is 220, then you'd get ~16.5amps total. Right?

[RamonGTP]

It won't be 10 amps, I can gaurantee that. It won't be 5 Amps either.

[electric]

go out and buy an amp meter ,take the readings of the computers
when their fired up

amps x whatever voltage you are using = watts


no one here can answer your question with out more information but
you can do it yourself with an amp meter and do the math or
better still get an electrician to do it