The only ways of switching my tv off is at the wall socket. Not ideal as it’s at the back of the damn thing so would have to move the 50 inch tv, stand and all to get to it.
Is it just a case of leaving it on standby when not in use.
That doesn’t seem very environmentally friendly.

Read the book to see exactly how environmentally unfriendly it is? I suspect that, although it will take “some” power, I bet it is almost immeasurably small… Got me wondering about ours now though…

Pretty standard on new(er) TVs. Ours (1 year old and about 8 years old) are either on or on standby. No option to turn off other than at the socket. Seems crazy, don’t know the rationale behind it.

If it’s LED, it’s likely to be drawing less than 1W of power. Most TVs no longer come with a power swicth.

could pull the lead out of the back if you’re really worried

Is it because lazy couch potatoes don’t have to walk across the room to switch it off?
To me it seems crazy you can’t just press a switch so it drains zero power.

aka_Gilo – Member
No option to turn off other than at the socket. Seems crazy, don’t know the rationale behind it.

A surge from swicthing on and off is far more likely to kill your device than anything else. The environmental impact of prematurely terminating an expensive electronic device is almost certainly far higher than the cumulative cost of standby mode.

Quick check and calculate… 0.3 watts of power on standby, so if it was on standby for the whole year, that’s about 30p in electricity a year. Yep, millions of TV’s that could be turned off is probably a significant amount, but an insignificant percentage of what we could actually save by swapping, a single bulb for a lower wattage, or remembering to fill the kettle appropriately once a year…

That doesn’t seem very environmentally friendly.

Depending on the standby power use of the TV & peripherals, get one of these if necessary…
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0075LK778/
We got given one free and have used it successfully for years with our Sony Bravia TV combined with the DVD player, Wii & Humax PVR.

Worth checking the manual to be sure, in my previous life as a Sky engineer remember showing several people that there TV’s did actually have a power button.
Sometimes it was hidden underneath and on a couple of Samsung and LG models it was actually a touch sensitive button/panel on the bezel around the screen.

Might be wrong but thought there was a directive brought out that all TV,s after a certain date had to have a specific power off button So they could be totally powered down as opposed to being put in standby as part of energy saving initiative.

that doesn’t seem very environmentally friendly.

Buying a 50″ TV or the fact it doesn’t have an off switch?

We have a TV, amp, PS3 and TiVo box, none of which have an proper off switch, they just sit in standby when not in use.

Buying a 50″

LED that’s uses a bloody lot less power than the 7 year old 32 inch it replaced. But at least that had an on off switch.

Might be wrong but thought there was a directive brought out that all TV,s after a certain date had to have a specific power off button

Not sure of the details for TVs but the EuP Directive enforces power saving in new appliances
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Ecodesign_Directive

LED that’s uses a bloody lot less power than the 7 year old 32 inch it replaced. But at least that had that needed an on off switch due to high stand by.

As above stand by power is tiny. If you are worried about these things turn off your wifi/oven/microwave and various other devices that often use a lot of power when not in use.

STW. The only place where owning a telly makes you a polar bear clubbing couch potato. Cool.

LED that’s uses a bloody lot less power than the 7 year old 32 inch it replaced. But at least that had that needed an on off switch due to high stand by.

This thread has wasted more leccy than that.

paulosoxo – Member

LED that’s uses a bloody lot less power than the 7 year old 32 inch it replaced. But at least that had that needed an on off switch due to high stand by.

This thread has wasted more leccy than that.

Its ok, they were recycled electrons. 😉

I had the same dilemma about 5 years ago. Wanted a decent TV with a physical off switch. The only ones I found and liked were the Sony Bravia. Hate seeing that little red light, glowing for no purposeful reason.

If you are worried about these things turn off your wifi/oven/microwave and various other devices that often use a lot of power when not in use.

Yup, they’re (mostly) all off. But more importantly, than a bit of electricity, our dog sleeps in the kitchen and dogs can hear the led flickering. To them it’s like constant tinnitus, apparently.

dogs can hear the led flickering. To them it’s like constant tinnitus, apparently.

Man they must really hate those LED collars then!

When I was little I was always told to turn everything off at the mains overnight in case it blew up and started a fire – this was when radios and TVs still used valves.

I still turn everything off now, although in recent years I’ve started leaving the router on overnight.

I’ve no idea how likely an LED TV or Xbox on standby is to burst into flames, but it just seems lazy to leave them on.

30p in electricity for a year… It would cost me more in food/energy to turn the plug on and off everyday. 😯

When I was little I was always told to turn everything off at the mains overnight in case it blew up and started a fire

When I was little my mum always insisted in leaving the plugs in the sockets to “stop the electricity leaking out” 😀

even regardless of those more recent directives (or proposals), my router and the one before (and possibly the one before that), all had/have features to turn wifi off overnight, even disconnect and go to sleep overnight.
and the 5GHz wifi (think that’s not legal in UK yet, but is in Germany) automatically listens to the 5GHz band and can disable itself.

I leave everything on. Satellite TV boxes and indeed the TVs update themselves overnight. PCs, NAS, etc. do backups overnight. PC runs 24/7/365 (minus about 5 minutes per year swapping an HDD/SSD), so 30p/year for the telly to be on is nothing.

dogs can hear the led flickering

My WIFE can hear LEDs flickering. No wireless chargers allowed either….

We have a TV, amp, PS3 and TiVo box, none of which have an proper off switch, they just sit in standby when not in use.

PS3 can be set up to go into full power down mode when you press the off switch.

Surely it is the whine of the transformer that she can hear?

I can often tell if something is switched on, even when it has no LEDs on it, though modern switching transformers seem to be a lot better.

This sort of thing is why I keep coming to STW. 🙂

Yes, it is. Well – not transformer really, whatever modern equivalent is in there. It is the wireless charger itself though (cheap knockoff rather than Nokia) because the noise stops when we unplug it.

Surely it is the whine of the transformer that she can hear?

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQB6OYxHaTQ[/video]

Be afraid.

I can hear the high pitched ‘whistling’ from TV’s in standby as well. It’s flippin’ annoying.

Oh and Tivo boxes do have a proper power off switch. It’s on the back next to the power socket, so depending how/where your box is installed may be no use at all!

30p in electricity for a year… It would cost me more in food/energy to turn the plug on and off everyday.

It’s cumulative though, isn’t it.

30p for your TV. But then typically there’s the set top box / PVR, games comsole, amp, DVD / Blu-ray player, router, microwave, NAS, printer, laptop, and several portable device chargers all of which are probably left plugged in and quietly draining juice.

I’ve been meaning for a while now to get one of those meter things, see how much I’m actually wasting.

I’ve been meaning for a while now to get one of those meter things, see how much I’m actually wasting.

Probably about 1% of the cost of one of those meter things 😀