21 Jan
2009
21 Jan
'09
11:42 a.m.
On Wed, 2009-01-21 at 19:13 +0000, Tony Duell wrote:
Err, historical accuracy? The PSU is as much a part of the system design
as the CPU (OK, maybe I exagerate, but not by very much). I know that if
I owned a large adn rare machine (large VAX, PDP10, etc), I'd want to
keep it as original as possile.
That's all very well, but if it costs you three times as much to run
because of the huge inefficient power supply then it all starts to seem
less practical. That's the sort of thing that makes the difference
between a viable system that you can actually use and enjoy, and a bulky
ornament.
Gordon
Umm. No. That transformer is a ferro-resonant
transformer. It
*needs* 3-phase to work! It supplies the basic 12v DC that are then
used to by the linear regulators. It's those that burn the power as
heat. Replacing the linear regulators with switchers will reduce the
consumed power by a lot.
Since extremely high current switchers are relatively cheap (at least
compared to getting three-phase installed, and massive aircon systems),
is there any reason why you *wouldn't* go down this route? Particularly
for a machine that's going to be on a lot?