EcoGeek is happy to bring you the writing of Mr. Zonbu, who is blogging his experiences with the Zonbu mini-PC in detail at mrzonbu.wordpress.com.

I’ve had my Zonbu for a few days now and I wanted to revisit the topic of energy use. This morning when I got up I reset my Kill-a-watt and went about using the PC. Five hours have passed since then, and aside from a 45 minute break I spent enjoying my day off at the pool, the machine has been in regular use as my desktop…

How much power did the Zonbu consume?

I confirmed that I had rolled exactly 5h 0m on the Kill-a-watt time counter, and I looked at the total KWH used. As you might have guessed, since the box runs ~10W, it used a paltry 0.05 KWH of power over the last five wall-clock hours.

That is impressive.

Not only has it used virtually no electricity, but it has been blissfully silent. It is warm to the touch (not surprisingly, given the box is one big heat sink), but not uncomfortably hot.

Please include lm-sensors

If the lm-sensors package is installed so that environmental variables can be read, then I can’t find it. I hope the Zonbu team add it so we can more closely monitor the fan speeds, system temperatures and so on. I use it on some other VIA C7 boards that I have in my data center and it comes in handy.

Conclusion

I’d like to write a big long post about how nice and efficient and green the box is, but I think we’ve covered all the key poitns. The box is small, it is silent, and it often uses even less than the 15W rating they talk about on their website. What a pleasant discovery. I’ll let you return to the other, more scintillating topics on this blog.

- Mr. Zonbu

Wireless computer peripherals are awesome. Cords are already plentiful enough in our lives. Which is why I'm a big fan of wireless keyboards and mice. Just plug a receiver into a USB port, and your mouse and keyboard will work anywhere in the room. A worthwhile investment.

Unfortunately, that means that your mouse and keyboard will require batteries. And batteries need to be replaced or recharged. Replacing batteries means toxic waste and recharging them means MORE CORDS!!!

Which is why I can't believe no one has been able to develop solar powered wireless mice yet. Wireless solar keyboards are simpler, because they require much less power and have more surface area. But wireless solar mice are finally being developed, and I'm very happy to hear it.

The solar mouse (called the Sole Mio) was designed over four years at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands. You can check out their full press release at their website.

Over time it is estimated that several hundred million batteries could be saved annually on a global scale. The net environmental benefit is still restricted by the high energy content of current PV cells. However the introduction of new types of cheap and energy-extensive PV cells, on which TU Delft and partners are working, would eventually yield an even higher environmental gain.

Unfortunately, so far it seems like the solar panels don't provide quite enough power to keep the little guys running. In tests, it's been shown that they have to be stored on a window ledge in order to keep them charged up. And, of course, long stints with the panels covered by the hand (as of course they will be during use)  shortens battery life significantly. Looks like we're going to need either more efficient solar panels or less power-hungry mice. Luckily, I can guarantee you both of those things are on the way.

Via TreeHugger

See Also
-Solar Powered Laptop Case-
-Solar Powered Cell Phone-
-Solar Powered MP4 Player-