When we talk about the hardware of a PC , we all know that the elements that consume the most energy are the graphics card and the processor, generally in that order (except in office automation or low-consumption equipment with integrated graphics). However, the consumption of the rest of the components usually goes unnoticed and yet they also add a good handful of watts to the total sum of what a PC consumes, so what are the PC components that consume the most energy ?
We live in an era in which there is nothing to waste; the price of electricity does not stop rising, and now that billing for time slots has been implemented in Spain in which electricity costs more than double what it used to cost at peak times, it is worth knowing what the components are of the PC that consume the most to be able to act accordingly.
The graphics card and the processor, the hardware that consumes the most
At this point we all know that the CPU and the GPU are the two components that consume the highest consumption of all the PC hardware, and that is that the manufacturers already give us some TDP values that although they do not indicate the electricity consumption as such, Yes, they are used as a guide because consumption usually yields quite similar values.
In this way, a modern mid-range processor usually has a consumption of up to 95 watts at maximum load, although at rest its consumption can be approximately 20 watts, while a high-end CPU can have consumption peaks. 150 watts or even more depending on whether it has been overclocked.
As for the graphics card, a low-end GPU that does not even need extra power from the power supply can consume up to 75 watts, although higher-end models can shoot this figure up to more than 400 watts. in some cases of graphics with Overclock. The consumption of the graphics card depends a lot on the model, since although it is true that at rest its consumption is usually about 40 watts more or less regardless of the GPU you use, the GPUs for gaming can have consumption under maximum load that goes from 90 to almost 400 watts that we have already mentioned before.
Of which there is no doubt is that the graphics card and the processor are the hardware components that have the highest consumption, and usually in that order.
What hardware components have the highest consumption?
Leaving aside the CPU and GPU, which, as we have already mentioned, are the hardware elements that have the highest consumption, and which varies a lot between models, the rest of the PC components also consume energy and, in this case, usually have a considerable variation. smaller.
After CPU and GPU, the next component that consumes the most energy is the motherboard , whose consumption can range from 25 to 100 watts in the highest-end models; Keep in mind that the motherboard already supplies power to the PCI-Express sockets (up to 75 watts) even if it does so through by-pass (this means that it is only an intermediary, since what really consumes is the GPU connected to the socket ), but it is also responsible for powering the USB ports, the chipet (which is still a kind of processor), the integrated sound card, the integrated network card, etc. In addition, the VRMs that filter and power the CPU and RAM memory also have some consumption that is lost in the form of heat.
If your PC still uses optical drives, you should know that these are the next components in the consumption classification since a DVD drive can consume up to 15 watts when it is in read operation, and even reach 30 watts of consumption when a DVD is being recorded. Did you know this information?
The next hardware component that has the highest consumption are mechanical hard drives , since although when they are at rest they barely consume 0.7 watts, when they are at maximum load their consumption can reach 9 watts, 12 watts if the hard disk is of high performance (10,000 RPM or more). The hard disk is followed by the RAM , which in the case of DDR4 can consume between 2 and 5.5 watts depending on the speed and voltage, and keep in mind that we are talking about consumption per module, so yes you have 4 modules installed, you have to multiply their consumption by 4. Oddly enough, 4 high-performance overclocked RAM modules can consume more than 20 watts.
After these elements, we have the fans , which depending on the size, speed and others, can consume between 1 and up to 6 watts on average; As with RAM, this figure must be multiplied by the number of fans you have on your PC.
Finally, the hardware component that consumes the least is the SSD , whose consumption ranges from 0.6 W at rest to 3.5W at maximum load , as long as they are not SSDs with a PCI-Express connection, since then their consumption may be increased.
Obviously, there are other less common components in the PC that also have some electrical consumption, such as a card reader (from 0.5 to 2 watts), a RAID controller (from 5 to 15W), a dedicated sound card ( 5 to 45 watts) or a PCIe WiFi card (up to 10 watts), but as we have said they are less common and not everyone has them on their PC.
PC peripherals also have a certain consumption
Obviously, so far we have only dealt with the internal hardware of the PC, but it is impossible to use a PC without its peripherals such as the mouse, the keyboard and of course the monitor, so in sum the consumption of the entire equipment is much higher.
As a general rule, USB peripherals have a fairly low consumption; for example, a full-size mechanical keyboard with LED lighting on all keys works at 0.9 amps and 5V voltage, which gives us a consumption of 4.5 watts; with the lighting off, this same keyboard works at 0.7A and 4.9V, so its consumption drops to 3.43W. For its part, a gaming mouse with RGB lighting usually has a fairly similar consumption, of about 3-4 watts.
What consumes the most of the PC peripherals is undoubtedly the monitor, and again we enter a field in which consumption differs a lot depending on the model, size and type of matrix used. For example, a Dell UltraSharp U3415W monitor that has a 34-inch LED-IPS matrix (it is ultra wide) has a typical consumption of 40 watts, but a 24-inch Full HD monitor could consume only 30 watts while a monitor of 32 inches and 240 Hz can consume up to 100 watts.
