Satellite, cable and Internet set top boxes can consume lots of precious energy! With the advent of more energy efficient LED TV’s you’ll be surprised to see that your digital box could be consuming more energy than your screen – unless you’ve still got a plasma telly!
Let’s take a look at the major media provider’s equipment to see how they stack-up on electricity consumption. Sky+ HD Satellite set-top boxes have improved lately with the adding of eco features such as auto switch off and power saving modes. Even with these features enabled a Sky+ Box could be consuming £35 worth of electricity per year (based on 4 hours viewing per day) with eco setting enabled. That’s more energy consumed than a good performing energy efficient washing machine! Turn off the eco features or forget to put it on standby and you could be looking at 2 or 3 times that!
So what about Virgin’s TiVo cable TV boxes? Well, their latest boxes use £24 worth of power per year. A Sust-it user tested his Samsung 80GB V+ Box, which is an older version of his cable set-top player/recorder, this came out at £33.50 a year. The latest BT YouView+ internet player recorder uses just £2.77p per year, well done BT! Again, if you turn off the eco setting it jumps to £12.65p per year. Their old Freeview Box eats £23.32 worth of electricity with the eco settings off.
Our advice is to take a good look at any eco settings when you setup your box, as these features will help reduce your energy bills long-term. Please don’t be tempted to override these settings. Okay, it may be a little frustrating to have to wait a short while after switching them on, however the savings will be well worth it!
