ASUS Intros DVD Writer with 50% Lower Power Draw

[btarunr]

ASUS announced a new retail and OEM channel DVD writer drive, the DRW-24B5ST. Built in the conventional 5.25-inch SATA form-factor, the drive is said to pack energy-efficient components that reduce idle power draw (mounted disc idling, and no disc idling), by 50%. ASUS branded this feature as E-Green. Armed with 1536 KB of cache, the drive offers DVD access times as low as 160 ms, and CD access times as low as 140 ms. It writes DVDs at speeds as high as 24X depending on the media type, and CDs at speeds as high as 48X. It is priced at 2,500 JPY (US $31).



View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[Roph]

It's like removing a significant portion of RAM from a GPU, and saying hey look! It draws less power!

 

[ASharp]

You can save 100% of the power by not bothering with a DVD drive at all.

 

[RejZoR]

This power usage obsession is getting a bit stupid. How much will you save with a e-Green power saver DVD writter? 5Wh a year? Assuming you burn stuff all the time...

 

[Bo$$]

How much cache do regular drives have?

 

[Maban]

How much cache do regular drives have?

I think 2MB is typical.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

You can save 100% of the power by not bothering with a DVD drive at all.

+1

I removed my DVD-RW and replaced it with a sentry MX and mounted a 120mm fan in the spare optical bays underneath it.

I rarely use my optical drive so it wasnt much of a loss by taking it out.

When i do have a need for an optical drive for installing games, watching a DvD or burning files to disc. I have a external slimline optical dvd-rw that i use with my netbook standing by

 

[claylomax]

You can save 100% of the power by not bothering with a DVD drive at all.

Every time there is news like this, someone just can't help to bash optical media
I couldn't live without my DVD drive, I use it everyday; how do you people burn your "stuff"

 

[brandonwh64]

I actually have mine unplugged due to every time my motherboard boots, it hangs at the optical drive until it realizes there is nothing in it then it will move on. I have not figured out how to turn that off so I just unplug it and replug it when it need it which is never.

 

[Static~Charge]

It's like removing a significant portion of RAM from a GPU, and saying hey look! It draws less power!

Reducing the drive's cache RAM isn't the source of the power savings. I've seen plenty of other drives with 1.5MB or even just 1MB of cache, and they aren't touted as "energy efficient".

One thing that ASUS doesn't mention is how much power this drive would draw with normal components. I suspect that the savings is miniscule, and this is just a marketing ploy.

 

[1c3d0g]

Every time there is news like this, someone just can't help to bash optical media
I couldn't live without my DVD drive, I use it everyday; how do you people burn your "stuff"

With something like this:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&A=ShowProduct&Q=&sku=828276&is=REG

Seriously, good riddance to CD/DVD/Blu-ray. O.S. installs go onto a USB flash drive. What the hell else do I need a burner for?

 

[Delta6326]

I actually have mine unplugged due to every time my motherboard boots, it hangs at the optical drive until it realizes there is nothing in it then it will move on. I have not figured out how to turn that off so I just unplug it and replug it when it need it which is never.

Sounds like your dvd drive was the boot priority.

Also last time I check burner took up like 15w.

 

[newtekie1]

I think 2MB is typical.

1MB, 1.5MB, and 2MB are all common for optical drives. Honestly, cache doesn't really matter much for optical drives, they are too slow as it is.

And seriously, how much power can this drive really save when idle. I doubt enough to ever make up for the price difference...

 

[Thefumigator]

This power usage obsession is getting a bit stupid. How much will you save with a e-Green power saver DVD writter? 5Wh a year? Assuming you burn stuff all the time...

Well, everything sums up... I believe, it makes more sense when you take the amount of people using e-green recorders. Imagine 100.000 computers, that would be 500.000Wh a year of power saving.

Also consider the amount of green stuff running in your computer, they all sum up. Imagine switching your cpu from a 95W to a 65W version, your VGA from 100W to one with a 90W power draw, also imagine 3 hard drives, switch them to green drives, save another 15~30 there, you get almost 100W less in the same box.

So at the end, even a 1W saving is a good thing for a PC part, specially if you are considering releasing a product that may sell massively.

This isn't supposed to be a feature for those who don't use a recorder, its meant to replace the non-green recorders. Actually, it makes me comfortable when industry takes this small but big detail, while of course its better to stop using the recorder at all. But in the need of using it, the green option is there.

Its analog to folding@home actually, where participation is more valuable than performance. "Massively" is the key word.

 

[Bo$$]

I actually have mine unplugged due to every time my motherboard boots, it hangs at the optical drive until it realizes there is nothing in it then it will move on. I have not figured out how to turn that off so I just unplug it and replug it when it need it which is never.

remove it from the boot order, then it wont check for disks