CFL bulbs are a no-brainer for "utility" areas, but they're less reliable than I had hoped

The average home is incredibly inefficient, and nowhere is this more obvious than the ubiquitous electric lightbulb. Compact fluorescent (CFL) and LED lights are an order of magnitude more efficient at converting electricity to lumens rather than heat, but making the switch is not simple. The limitations, pricing, and sheer variety of lighting options are daunting.

1 kW No One Could See

When I moved into my house, I was dismayed to find more than 1 kW of outdoor lighting. The previous owners had installed 150 Watt flood lights in every fixture under the eaves. You could probably land an airplane in my driveway, even in the fog. But these lights were completely invisible to the occupants (us!), and were often left on for long periods of time.

This is actually a fairly typical situation, with many homeowners opting for 100 W incandescent bulbs inside as well. I have long been a believer in 40 and 65 W bulbs, and preferred specialty 25 W bulbs for bedside lamps. And I’m dismayed by the sheer number of bulbs and fixtures all calling out to be filled: Both the master suite and children’s bathroom had 8 light sockets above the mirror, each with its own 100 W bulb!

Since incandescent bulbs convert most of their electricity into heat, rather than light, the average house has a lot more in common with an Easy Bake Oven that most homeowners are willing to admit. Although they would be hesitant to leave a hairdryer blowing all day long, they don’t notice their kitchen lights turning just as much electricity into heat!

Quick Fixes

Immediately after moving in, I replaced many of the “utility area” incandescents with compact fluorescent (CFL) bulbs. The porch, eaves, garage, and basement were the first areas upgraded, dramatically reducing power consumption and waste heat.  I also unscrewed every other bulb in the bathrooms, and no one has complained yet.

Next, I replaced some of the most difficult to reach bulbs with CFL’s in hopes that they would last longer and produce more light. This includes the dramatic, but insanely placed floodlight in the cathedral ceiling of our living room. It required an extension ladder to reach, so I certainly hope that bulb lasts the advertised 8000 hours!

No Perfect Alternative

One result I can share right off the bat is that today’s products really are cutting-edge. There are many circumstances where an energy-efficient alternative is simply not good enough to be accepted by the whole family. Less enthusiastic family members will not appreciate the long warm-up times typical of CFL bulbs, the dim output and weird coloration of inexpensive LEDs, and the strange behavior of dimmer switches.

I spend a lot of time changing out switches...

Rather than switch to CFL bulbs in the kitchen, I installed a high-tech electronic dimmer in hopes that we could throttle back the power usage of its 7 recessed lighting cans. This experiment ended in failure, since the dimmer was often pushed to the max.

Once CFL bulbs begin to start faster, I experimented with the “dimmable” variety came away unimpressed. They don’t dim all that much generally and were incompatible with my fancy electronic switch. I finally removed it, swapping in a plain old switch and a boatload of CFL bulbs. The whole kitchen now uses 105 Watts rather than the 525 the lights previously drew, and it’s brighter too!

We must also consider the cost of upgrades like this. CFL bulbs are definitely on the mass-produced/bargain and of the spectrum, with questionable quality and reliability. They’re now inexpensive enough to casually purchase and install. LEDs, on the other hand, are just barely becoming attainable, much less affordable. Sadly, energy efficiency is sometimes still a game for the rich.

Stephen’s Stance

Swapping out of box full of 100 to 150 W outdoor floodlights was a slam dunk, in my opinion. The replacement CFL’s produce more light, less heat, and draw less power on the whole than a single bulb before. The same goes for replacing utility lights, which are seldom used and often left on. But it is far more difficult to attack the core lighting used by family members every day. That is the topic of my future posts.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2012. | How I Eliminated Over 2 kW of Lighting at Home
This post was categorized as Everything, Personal, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

You can't tell me these things don't look cool!

I am in the process of upgrading my own home to make it more energy efficient. I do this mainly as an exercise of faith and science, since my electric and gas bills are not currently all that expensive. But I just can’t countenance burning 10 times more electricity than I need to, even if I can afford it. It’s also an exercise in geekiness, since today’s lighting alternatives and appliances have an undeniable techno-cool factor about them.

Over the next few months, I will be reporting on my experience with the latest in LED light bulbs, switches, power meters, and appliances. This is a continuing exercise, so don’t expect a resolution anytime soon. But I think that my experience will help you decide where to upgrade, and where to hold off.

A Level Set

My home is a large American-style brick/stucco suburban single-family home in Northeast Ohio. It was built in 1996 by a local builder with reasonable but not exceptional insulation and energy efficiency in mind. It’s about 3,000 square feet and features four bedrooms on two levels, plus a finished basement which adds another 1,500 square feet or so.

The home has its original gas furnace with forced air for heat and A/C. I was forced to add electric in-wall heaters in the basement since the forced air just wasn’t cutting it down there and diverting heat from the main floor made the second-floor bedrooms unreasonably hot. It originally had two gas hot water heaters, but I removed one when it failed. We’ll have to replace both the furnace and remaining water heater in the next few years since they’re getting quite worn out.

I’m not at all satisfied with the wiring in the house. It appears to have been done by someone who didn’t know much about electricity (perhaps even an Amish craftsman) and the connections are poorly finished and oddly chosen. I’ve re-wired some of the house already, in addition to adding Cat-6 Ethernet cabling to many of the rooms.

There’s no use trying to take a baseline energy reading at this point, since we’ve lived here for 4 years and I’ve made continual improvements since the day I moved in. I will try to compare efficiency as I replace major items, however.

Stephen’s Stance

Increasing energy efficiency is a first world problem, but we all have responsibility to take it on. Anyone geeky enough to read my blog will probably appreciate the cool factor of LED lamps and hybrid water heaters, and these will save money in the long run as well. Watch this space as I dive into the subject.

Here are the articles in this series:

• How I Eliminated Over 2 kW of Lighting at Home
• When Incandescent Bulbs Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Will Have Incandescent Bulbs

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2012. | My 2012 Project: Improving Energy Efficiency
This post was categorized as Everything, Features, Personal, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

LED Display Clock

First up is this LED display/clock. It consists of a series of colored LED lights which flash on and off below a slot cut in the hard drive platter. The perceptual illusion images it creates are just amazing!

Speaker

Next, we have a pair of drives set up as a speaker. They don’t call it a voice coil for nothing!

Music Video

Sticking with the Radiohead theme, here’s a home-made music video, including a recreation of the song, made entirely with old computer junk. Including ten hard drives.

Wind Chime

Not as creative, but still, it’s an old hard drive!

Stirling Engine

Stirling engines are the unicorn of the car-geek community. This one includes hard drive platters!

Eddy Currents With Hard Disk Magnets

Hard disk magnets are awesome. They’re super-strong rare earth magnets – my kids love ‘em! Here is a demonstration of eddy currents using old hard disk and Lego train parts. Double geek!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2008. | Friday Fun With Hard Drives
This post was categorized as Apple, Computer History, Enterprise storage, Personal, Terabyte home, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Although some shortcomings have appeared, I’m pleased with the Mac overall. It definitely met my expectations and continues to meet my needs, mixing portability and performance in an excellent package.  I am impressed by Apple’s hardware design and component choices, especially when compared to other computers with similar specifications that I have used.  And, as noted by Tom’s Hardware, the specification of the machine was reasonably priced, especially since I purchased it at a substantial discount and upgraded it myself.

This post is part of my series focused on switching from PC to Mac.

• How To Buy Discount Apple Computers
• Got Some AppleCare For Cheap
• Switch! or How the Mac (Finally) Won Me Over
• Switch Day 1: This Mac is Hot!
• Switch Day 58: Ten Pros and Cons of the MacBook Pro

1. The Value Quotient is High

The value of a computer system is determined by two elements: Its specification, in terms of the components used, and the net price.  Macs are known to be pricey but often include high-end components and materials in their construction.  Focusing solely on the core interchangeable components of my Mac, evaluating it as a generic PC, the overall value for the money is very high.

My MacBook Pro contains a high-spec NVIDIA 8600M GT graphics card with 128 MB of dedicated GDDR3 video memory, an Intel Core 2 Duo T7500 “Merom” CPU, Intel’s “Santa Rosa” PM965 chipset, built-in FireWire S800 and USB, a slot-loading 8x DVD-RW drive, gigabit Ethernet, Wireless-N Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, webcam, and slick features like an LED-backlit display and keyboard and infrared remote control.  My system’s MSRP was $2000, but I purchased it for $1524 (after receiving the rebate check).

Although PCs are available for less (I bought a family knockabout laptop for $435 recently!), a similar spec laptop from any major manufacturer would cost at least this much, even a year after this model MacBook Pro came out.  In my case, I am comparing the Mac to the Dell XPS M1330 laptop I use for work, which arrived the day before the Mac.  The Dell is a “thin and light” model with a 13″ screen, but feels almost the same weight as the Mac and is actually somewhat fatter with its 9-cell battery. The Dell retailed for $1700, including the inferior 8400M GS graphics and no gigabit ethernet.

Judging by these objective observations, the Mac was clearly a good value and features a strong set of components.  Note that both machines feature the flawed NVIDIA graphics chips, as do nearly all high-end notebooks, so I can’t fault anyone for that particular component choice.

2. Performance rocks

Even though my MacBook features the Merom CPU clocked at a modest (by 2008 standards) 2.2 GHz rather than the latest 2.4 GHz or more Penryn, the system as a whole just flies.  Mine is packed with 4 GB or RAM instead of the stock 2 GB, and my upgraded 320 GB hard drive is slightly quicker than the stock, both of which improve overall performance somewhat.  But even tasks that aren’t memory-intensive are super-quick, thanks to the 800 MHz front-side bus and solid system design.  The system is snappy in OS X, encodes video with ease, and is subjectively faster than my similar Dell when using Windows Vista Ultimate in Boot Camp.  The Dell has the same chipset and CPU, but is clocked at 2.0 rather than 2.2 GHz and has only 2 GB of RAM, so comparisons are not exactly apples-to-apples, but the Dell is noticeably slower.  

3. The Display is Gorgeous

The wide, LED-backlit 15″ screen is just gorgeous.  The off-angle performance is so good, even with the backlight turned all the way down, that the Mac suffers from serious over-the-shoulder “eavesviewing” issues.  My Dell is pretty much invisible off-angle, even without the privacy screen supplied by my company, but the Mac shows your photos and documents even at extreme angles. Not that I’m complaining, though – this performance just makes it that much more beautiful when I’m alone. There’s no need to constantly adjust the screen angle for optimal viewing.

4. The Chassis is Sturdy

The Mac really shines when one compares its sturdiness to the competition.  The Dell is flexy and plasticky, as is just about every non-ThinkPad PC notebook I’ve used recently.  But the Mac raises the bar even compared to my favorite laptop of all time, the brick-strong HP OmniBook 800.

The only poor spot is the nifty magnetic latch.  Although it works well most of the time (and exists – the Dell has no latch at all), it doesn’t lock closed as cleanly as I would like.  There is a gap around the edges, and lifting the closed Mac from one side tends to make the latch disengage.

5. Input is Solid

I’m a stickler for a good keyboard and can’t fault the Mac here.  It’s not exactly a Model M, but the keys feel good and are arranged and sized reasonably.  Even adjusting to the Mac keyboard layout hasn’t been much of an issue, since most functions remain in similar positions between Mac and Windows.

The trackpad is especially strong. PC notebooks normally have perplexingly tiny trackpads, so I’m always running out of space, but the Mac’s is generously sized and highly usable. It’s easily four times larger than the Dell’s!  I do wish there were two ”mouse” buttons, though.  Although OS X and Windows in Fusion supports two-finger-tap as a right-click, Boot Camp frustratingly does not!

6. The Apple Remote Could Be Improved

Let’s start by stating that I have never owned a PC that came with a remote control, so the Mac deserves kudos for even including one, though the 2008 models don’t. But the remote is just odd. Although it’s usable enough, it’s not integrated, hardware-wise, with the system. It’s clearly a throwback to the glossy white plastic Apple look of a half-decade ago, so like the power brick and DVI adapter it seems totally out of place next to the brushed aluminum MacBook Pro. And, judging from its size and shape, I expected it to dock in the ExpressCard slot of the Mac like a MoGo mouse, but it’s slightly too fat for that. Also, an IR remote seems out of date in these Bluetooth days. So, Apple, how about a dockable, Bluetooth, matching remote next time?

7. Battery Life Isn’t Great

Battery life has been about three hours in my hands, which isn’t terrible, but isn’t as good as I hoped. I ended up buying a second battery for the Mac for transcontinental flights. I did the same for my last Dell, of course, so this isn’t news. On the bright side, the Mac battery was cheaper and far more readily available than the Dell – I just dropped by the bright, cheery Apple store in Palo Alto during my last trip and picked one up instead of waiting for Dell to deliver one to my home. I still can’t get hot-swap to work, though, since my Mac refuses to suspend to disk.

8. Upgradability is Mixed

Upgrading the RAM on a MacBook Pro is just right, but swapping out the hard drive was much more difficult than it should have been. Disks should be user-replaceable, even in laptops, and the regular MacBook gets this right. The Mac also has poorer expandability than most PC laptops, since its Wi-Fi (sorry, “AirPort Extreme”) card is buried inside and it lacks a slot and antenna wiring for a 3G cell card. The fact that the Pro only has an ExpressCard slot isn’t that novel in today’s world, however, but the regular MacBook’s lack of one was a major factor in my choosing the Pro.

9. It’s Hot and Loud

My first impression was that the fan was deafening and the bottom was toasty. After using it for a few months, I have either gotten used to both or they aren’t as bad anymore. The machine still gets pretty hot on the bottom under heavy use, and the fan still makes a loud “whoosh”, but neither is unbearable or unusual when compared to other PCs, like my previous Dell XPS M1210.

10. Light Sensors are Confounding

I was intrigued by the idea of the MacBook Pro’s ambient light sensor, which would dim the display backlight and unique keyboard backlight under changing light conditions. But this was the first feature I disabled after actually using it. The sensor is located under your left pinky when typing, so the display suddenly dims and brightens as your hand passes over it. So I just adjust the backlight manually.

Then there is the keyboard backlight. The key cap markings are dark enough to be difficult to see in bright light, but the sensor won’t let the light come on, even when you press the hotkey to turn it on manually! I ended up installing Lab Tick to turn it on manually within OS X, but I expected more from Apple engineering. The light sensor is worse than useless.

11. USB is a Disappointment

As I noted in another post, the lack of a full-power dedicated USB port is a special disappointment. The 15″ MacBook Pro has just two ports, like most modern PC notebooks, but both are compromised. The one on the left lacks the power to spin up an external hard drive, and the one on the right is shared with the internal iSight camera. At least the FireWire is blazing fast and fully-powered! But I expected a better design from Apple.

12. The AC Adapter Is Obnoxious
    My biggest complaint is the “elegant” MagSafe AC adapter. Count the flaws:
    • The poor strain relief on the thin cable is known to fray and burn
    • Third-party replacements and alternatives are not available thanks to Apple patents
    • The cord-wrap “ears” aren’t large enough to actually hold the entire wrapped cord
    • The fact that there are three different identical-looking adapters with different wattage outputs is a nightmare waiting to strike the unwary
    • The iPod-like on-brick plug just barely hangs on when the weight of the brick is hung from a vertical wall outlet
    • Glossy white?!?

The AC adapter is a perfect example of the form-over-function flaws always cited by Apple critics. I expected better, and Apple refuses to admit the defects even as these things spark and burn.

Again, I’m happy overall with the Mac and would definitely buy one again. In fact, I think it’s about the best computer purchase I’ve ever made, even including the iPhone and my beloved OmniBook 800 and Portege 3010 subnotebooks. The flaws are minor compared to the overall strengths!

(Ok, there are twelve pros and cons, but ten rolls off the tongue better!)

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2008. | Switch Day 58: Ten Pros and Cons of the MacBook Pro
This post was categorized as Apple, Personal, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.