Does anyone use P3s Kill a Watt?

[sijsk89]

Not reeally sure what category to put this in but I wanted to know if any of you have used watt/volt meters. My electric bill is often hugely varying and I'd like to get a watt meter for some of my outlets to calculate how much each one is costing so I can better monitor usage. I wanted to know if there are some to avoid, some to consider more seriously and most importantly if I could plug the meter into a wall socket then plug a power strip into the meter, or if that could cause a safety hazard.

Thanks again!

 

[drtweak]

Yup I got the Kill A Watt a while back to see how much power everything is using. Really useful. Also came in handy when a client of mine for some reason his Battery Backups kept switching back and forth from Batter to AC power all the time. Found out the load on the AC breaker was just too much for some reason. Guess someone on the same breaker was printing from two laserjet printers causing the issue. It is useful and worth the money i think if you are trying to track down what stuff is using power.

 

[sijsk89]

Cool! Still wondering if it would be alright to do wall socket > kill a watt > power strip. Any experience with that?

 

[drtweak]

Yup! Thats what i did for a lot of things. Like i wanted to see what my WHOLE PC was using while gaming including monitor. Just plugged it into the wall socket then the power strip into that. Works great. Tell you a great deal. You can also use it to find out how much power things are using while in sleep mode like DVR's, TV Ect, but i wouldn't recommend turning off Digital Tuner for TV off completely espcially for Dish stuff because it takes FOREVER to power cycle and if its not on all the time they will drop the box as well and you have to call them up to have it readded.