I can see this being a PITA

kwikbreaks

New EU regs apparently say modems and routers sold from now on must power themselves down if not in use.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-30643357

I leave my VDSL modem and router on 24x7. With a power consumption of around 10w each and the heat from this providing welcome warming for my home for a good portion of the year I don't regard this as a waste. It means I can pick up a tablet and get instant internet access without dicking about with powering up anything. Apart from that I have stuff running on a PC that periodically uploads to the web and CCTV cameras that I can access remotely. How long can stuff stay idle before it has to be powered down?

If the story is correct the likes of Virgin Media for one will have to provide kit from now on that powers down when not in use unless sleep means what the kit does now anyway in which case why mention modems and routers? Now they aren't going to be running one firmware on new kit and old firmware on the rest so this change will be rolled out universally. VM have an abysmal track record with firmware changes - it took them over a year for Superhub 1 to be usable.

I suspect other companies remotely update firmware in kit they supply and support too. BT maybe? Even if they don't many people switch providers and kit does fail.

Am I missing something here or are EU bureaucrats interfering with stuff they really don't comprehend again just as they did with their pointless rules on cookies which have caused upteen companies cost and brought zero benefit to consumers.

custardy

leave a torrent running. never not in use?

kwikbreaks

Well I have the TBB monitor constantly pinging mine so I'm not personally worried. If that was insufficient I could easily have a WAMP server running and periodically do a get from a script on my remote server but I suspect most people would not be doing anything like that.

tavernman

Whatever will they think of next, Pacemakers that go to sleep:eek:

Strider590

I'm sure most of these devices will have the option to turn this off.

But yet again, it's a case of EU bureaucrats messing with stuff they don't understand.

Or maybe they do understand? The consequence of certain devices being powered up/down more often also means increased levels of early life failures, which in turn means a boost in consumerism for replacement devices. I wonder how many of these influential people have shares and vested interests in the companies that produce these goods?

Oblivion

My router is all the central heating I've got! :eek:

enfield_freddy

I "thought" I had read somewhere that it was recommended that you left your modem/router running 24/7 , if you turned it off the exchange sensed a fault and capped your IP until it had settled down?

[Deleted User]

They're not switching off, they just have to go onto standby:

"new devices sold from Thursday will fall to sleep, using a trickle of power when they are not in use."

So presumably they will power up automatically when they receive a signal from the computer. I agree it's p*ssing into the wind, but if they did anything more constructive people would get even more agitated.

Tropez

I don't see an issue with this.

The Sky Hub SR102 - although far from a shining example of technology - automatically switches to a low-energy "sleep" mode when not in use and as someone who uses several WiFi enabled computers, phones, tablets and streaming media services I've never once noticed any issue related to it doing this (and I'm always quite happy to moan about the Sky Hub! )

The technology that exists in this day and age should make switching from low-power states to "on" barely, if at all, noticeable.

kwikbreaks

A modem is either synced or not synced. If it's in standby it would need to re-establish sync. That isn't instant.

The fact that these are new regulations suggest that the EU bureaucrats are dissatisfied with current energy saving measures.

I have no issues with the vacuum cleaner regs as I've always thought that 1Kw + is way overkill for sucking crap off the carpet and was just a willy waving exercise by the manufacturers but a typical modem/router uses 10w to 15w when fully loaded and like everything with a cpu in it that load drops automatically when the load is light so these things use around 10w on average and half the time any excess heat isn't really wasted anyway in the UK - it just cuts down the load on the central heating.

Tropez

Well I looked up the actual requirements and I can't see how many home users would be affected.

The Huawei VDSL modem used by BT for Infinity subscribers runs at around 6 watts. The EcoDesign requirements require networked equipment that is not in use but still switched on to not run higher than 12 watts in 2015, dropping to 8 watts in 2017.

You state your modem is using 10 watts so for the next couple of years it is within the EcoDesign requirements anyway.

The Sky Hub SR102 which I have, which includes a VDSL modem, has already been certified by the European Union as meeting the requirements outlined in the EcoDesign directive and it does not lose sync.