Click here for more information While this is not the product of the century or one that will make the top ten list in many peoples minds, this is indeed a great product if you need to know what your current draw and power consumption is on a given appliance. It should be noted that this unit should not be used on high amperage load units such as a refrigerator or an air conditioner, it does have a great function for the miriad of smaller units such as your computer current usage, the display consumption such as a plasma and yes even a LCD since they are getting so large that consumption is up on these as high if not higher than plasmas with the newer power saving electronics.
This is a great item to evaluate reducing your "carbon footprint" and finding what products achieve that end. It is also an incredible unit to document the power reduction in properly setting/calibrating TVs/Flat Panels/projectors and such. Studies have shown that properly calibrated displays can have a 20,30, and even 40 percent reduction in energy usage, and this unit can help document the changes.
The Watts Up Pro requires a computer or notebook to run the software that is available from the company to chart, graph, and spreadsheet the measured parameters. If you are serious about tracking and analyzing your power consumption, then this reasonably priced unit will help you achieve it. Watts Up Pro AC Power Meter
If you want to measure an appliance that draws constant power, you can use P3 International P4400 Kill A Watt Electricity Usage Monitor. However for appliances that draws large current some of the time, and low current some other time, you would have to sit around watching the kill-a-watt for hours, in order to measure how long it stays in the high power mode, and how long in the low power mode. This is not practical.
This device watts up is equivalent to kill-a-watt plus "sitting around watching for hours", so you can measure how much electricity is used by an appliance in a given amount of time.
The device has 5 modes: watts, watt hours, time, cost, volts, amps. In the watts mode you can check the watts, the minimum watts (over a span of time), maximum watts, etc. You can only see one reading at a time, cycling through them using the select button. The most useful mode is the time mode -- it measures duty cycle.
There is no direct way to tell what mode you're in. You have to look at the clues in the display. Basically you memorize how each measurement is displayed, and memorize which mode that measurement belongs to. If you don't remember (like after not using it for a few weeks), time to consult the manual. It is a free download from the manufacturer. There is also a quick reference showing all the modes and the measurements taken by each. However the quick reference doesn't show the display, so if you're lost not knowing which mode you're in or how to get to a certain mode, you still need to check the full manual. Come on, watts up with these people? A $120 device should have a friendlier user interface -- at least a mode indicator.
I use it to check the duty cycle of dehumidifiers at various humidity settings. I haven't used the USB features.
Easy to set up if you have a recent electricity bill on hand. Able to compute average monthly costs based on your current rate. Our electricity rates change for the summer so I will have to remember to change it.
I tested it on my laptop power supply for fun and could see when the battery was charging and how often. (Total power requirement negligible.)
Now to test my 11 year old air conditioner. - Green 3 - Kilowatt Utilization - Power Monitor - S Up Pro Es
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