Belkin energy saving devices
A threesome of helpful devices to cut electricity waste
Here are three Belkin energy saving devices that I think offer a range of useful features for cutting accidental electricity waste: an energy saving outlet that shuts off power to the plugged-in device after a preset time interval; and two power strips to control power to a number of peripherals or auxilliary devices when a master device (e.g. computer, television) stops drawing power. All three can have a big impact on your electricity bill.
If you use a Kill A Watt Meter or Belkin energy cost monitor to measure the electricity usage of your household appliances, you may find that computers and peripherals, and cell phone and other battery chargers, don't seem to use very much electricity - 10 to 20 watts of power draw, for example. But those 10 to 20 watts can add up to a lot of kilowatt hours when you multiply them by 24 hours by 365 days, especially when you consider that you might have half a dozen or more such devices plugged in all the time.
Belkin Conserve Socket
The first of the Belkin energy saving devices I'll present is the Belkin Conserve Socket energy saving outlet. This is just a plug that plugs into a plug, but with one important difference - the plug has a time-out. Suppose you need to charge your cell phone for a few hours. You plug the charger into an outlet when you get home, and the phone into the charger, and leave it there overnight. In the morning you take the cellphone but leave the charger plugged in.
Depending on the charger, it could be drawing current only when a cell phone is connected, or it may be drawing current continuously. If the later case, you're charging the battery for a few hours every day or so, but using electricity for the charger continuously. If you have a more efficient charger, it will not use electricity when there's no cell phone connected, but it may still use energy when the cell phone is connected but already fully charged.
The Belkin Conserve Socket helps out here with a three-setting switch that lets you set how long you want the socket to remain on. Plug it in, and choose one of three settings: half an hour, three hours, or six hours. Plug your device into it, and it will draw current for the time you selected. After that - c'est fini - no more power to the device.
Cell phone chargers won't use that much electricity - many use none at all when no phone is attached, and even those that do are probably only going to waste 1 kWh every 4 to 5 days. But other devices that draw more current will result in more savings if you make sure they shut off when you're done with them, even if you forget to shut them off yourself. You can use the Belkin Conserve Socket with a small space heater, and set it to keep you warm for a few hours but to go off afterwards, so you don't leave the heater running while you're away. Or iron your shirts, but set the outlet to a half hour so you don't have to worry, once you're at work, that you might have left the iron plugged in. Fans are a great way to stay cool in summer, but they do no good at all when there's no one in the room, since it's the moving air that evaporates your sweat that keeps you cool. Plug your fan into a Belkin Conserve outlet and it will stop swirling air needlessly around after you're gone.
For only $10 this outlet is a good though modest addition to your energy saving devices toolkit. It's very simple to use and it should be obvious to anyone what the benefits are. Compared to a typical automatic timer that turns the current on or off at preset times, and is generally somewhat hard to use, the Belkin Conserve outlet is ridiculously simple - choose the length of time you want it on for, and it starts its countdown. This device gets generally very positive reviews from consumers, although there is one consistent complaint, namely that there is no way to turn it off. (There is - just unplug it for a moment - but it would have been wise of Belkin to add a fourth setting to the switch - a zero minutes or Cancel setting!)
Other great uses of the Belkin Conserve outlet include setting a heater or air conditioner to run for a short time before bed, so the bedroom is comfortable when you retire; plugging a television into it so that if you walk away and forget to turn it off, it shuts off automatically after a few hours; preventing a curling iron from staying on all day; plugging Christmas lights into it so that they're on for a while but not necessarily on a 24-hour timer; and running a crock pot for 3 hours (on high) or 6 hours (on low) and then having it shut off so dinner is warm but not scalding hot when you get home.
Belkin Conserve Energy Saving Power Strip
When you shut down your desktop PC or your television set, did you know that all the other devices connected to it are typically still drawing power - whether they're turned on, such as computer speakers; in standby mode, waiting for the remote control to activate them; or just telling you the time, such as a DVD player. The more such devices are connected, the more additional current you're drawing. Little things can add up especially over days, months and years, which is where the Belkin Conserve power strip can help.
I should note that this problem of standby power draw has been with us ever since the first electronic appliances were introduced, along with the little black AC/DC converters that power many of them; and as a result, many manufacturers have improved the performance of their devices so that little or no power is drawn when the device is not on. Before spending $30 to $50 on an energy saving power strip to eliminate electricity waste, you may want to try measuring your device consumption with a Kill a Watt meter or Belkin energy cost monitor to see whether there's any benefit. My old PC speakers draw 15-20 watts continuously - even when the speakers themselves are turned off. But the more recent battery charger for my ThinkPad T60 doesn't draw any power at all when the ThinkPad isn't connected, so there would be little benefit in a device that cuts current to the power supply when the supply is not needed - there's already something in the power supply to take care of that. In general, any electronics device that carries the ENERGY STAR logo (such as an energy efficient tv) should already consume very little power when plugged in and turned off.
The Belkin Conserve Energy Saving Power Strip simply monitors the power consumed by the master device (in this case, you plug your TV into the 'master' plug), and when it detects the current drops to the point where the TV is turned off, it cuts power to 5 controlled outlets for DVD players, VCRs, and other devices that you have plugged into the outlet. When you turn the master device back on, the power strip restores power to the 5 other outlets. The Belkin Conserve Power Strip also includes two outlets that are always on, so that devices that need to stay on always, such as digital video recorders and cable or satelite boxes, can remain on at all times.
The only drawback of a power strip like this one is that when devices with a digital clock are automatically powered down after the TV is turned off, their digital clocks will tend to give a flashing 12:00 continuously whenever power is restored to them. I have an ingenious solution to this problem, thought up by my mother, who got fed up with the flashing clock on her microwave at the cottage, where frequent power outages meant it was mostly wrong: put a small piece of tape over the clock! Chances are you don't need every electronic device in your home to tell you the time.
You can use the Belkin Conserve Smart Power Strip not only with a home entertainment center (television/LCD as the master device, and DVD/Blu-Ray players, VCR players, DVRs, gaming devices, surround sound system, mood lighting... as the controlled devices) but with computer equipment, so that devices like printers, scanners, speakers, routers, and displays are powered off when the PC itself is powered off.
This energy saving power strip is easy to figure out - the master outlet is labeled clearly, the master control outlets are also labeled clearly and are color coded accordingly, and the two non controlled outlets at the end of the power strip are also cleary identified. There is also an on/off power switch at one end so that you can shut off power to the entire strip if needed.
The master outlet generally works well at detecting when power is being drawn by the master device, but there are some TVs or LCD displays for which it is not well suited, primarily those whose standby power draw is too high. If your TV or LCD is ENERGY STAR qualified it should consume no or very minimal power when in standby mode, but some older TVs do draw up to 50 watts of power even in standby mode, so the power strip may assume that standby mode means on, and keep providing power to the master-controled outlets even though the TV is switched off. If you have an older TV or LCD or plasma screen, you should consider using an electricity meter like the Kill A Watt Meter or Belkin energy cost monitor to measure your master device power consumption when powered off. If it draws less than 10 watts, there's a good chance the Belkin Conserve Smart AV Power Strip won't work for you.
One other great feature of this power strip is that Belkin provides total power surge protection to the devices connected to it, so sudden spikes in power won't damage your electronic equipment. In fact the Belkin Conserve Smart AV Power Strip comes with a $100,000 connected equipment warranty, so if a power surge does damage equipment connected to it, you are covered. (Some conditions apply, of course!)
Belkin Conserve Energy Saving Surge Strip
As noted above, one problem some people experience with the Belkin Conserve Smart AV Power Strip is that it may not detect when the master device has entered standby or low-power mode, so the master-controlled devices can continue to draw power even when the master device is actually off.
The Belkin Conserve Energy Saving Surge Strip solves this problem by providing you with a remote switch that is used to shut off power to the controlled devices. Unfortunately it's an either-or situation: either you get the Belkin Conserve Smart AV power strip, which does not come with a remote contorl, or you get the Belkin Conserve Energy Saving surge strip, which does not detect when the master device goes into standby mode (there is no master device plug on this power strip - only six outlets controlled by the remote switch, and two outlets that are always on).
Nonetheless, this power strip is an improvement over a traditional surge protector power strip that only lets you turn everything on or off, and only lets you do so from a switch located on the power strip itself. The remote control feature means you can have the power strip in an out of the way location (e.g. on the floor behind your home entertainment center) and you can turn it on from wherever you're sitting. That is, as long as you can find the remote control!
Fortunately, this power strip comes with a wall mounting bracket that lets you store the remote control on the wall, for example next to a light switch. You can either leave it there permanently or store it there when you're not using it.
The remote control and power strip both come with three dip switches to control which wireless channel is used to control the device. That gives you eight possible settings, so in theory you could have up to eight power strips and eight remotes in your house, and not have them interfere with one another. (Ceiling fan remotes may interfere with the Belkin Power Strip remote, but with the eight settings you'll most likely find at least one that doesn't cause conflicts.)
Many people use these devices for PC control - leave your router and cable/DSL modem plugged into the always on outlets, and your desktop PC, speakers, printer, paper shredder etc. plugged into the remote-controlled outlets. But in my household we turn off the router and modem when we're not using them, and I can see this device being a great addition to our home. (Turning them off saves us about 30 watts of power draw, and the 1-2 minute wait while a new connection is established doesn't bother me.)
But one thing that does bother me is that my router and modem are in the basement (in the 'home office' we rarely use). Since I usually work at the dining room table, it would be handy to be able to turn the router and modem on or off from the ground floor without having to go downstairs. A remote control would let me do this.
Many users of the Belkin Conserve Energy Saving Surge Strip have complained that the remote control does not work well or does not last long, but Belkin appears to have addressed this concern by coming out with a newer model of the surge strip (the one listed here).
Green devices for a better planet
Overall, I'm impressed with the efforts Belkin is making to design and sell electronic control devices that make it easy to save energy. For die-hard energy savers like me, turning off devices that aren't in use is second nature, but most people either can't remember, or can't be bothered, to shut everything down ever time it's not in use, unless you make that process painless. These three Belkin energy saving devices do make it easy for anyone to reduce their power usage without undo effort, so they get top marks as far as I'm concerned.
If you have purchased any of these Belkin energy saving devices and would like to review them or comment on this article, please submit your comments through my Contact form and I will be happy to post them here!
Return from Belkin energy saving devices to Saving electricity or to the Green Energy Efficient Homes site home page.
© Green Energy Efficient Homes Inc. 2012 Privacy policy | Disclaimers
New! Comments
Have your say about what you just read! Leave me a comment in the box below.