[somenameforme]

As an aside about GPUs, things have changed a lot over the years. In the early 2000s games were being released that were impossible to run on high settings with current hardware, and your hardware was outdated after 3 months and obsolete after a year.

Today An RX580 (released in 2017) can be had for $100-$200 and is enough to comfortably run any modern game at quite nice settings. It's been a while since I looked as well, it's entirely possible the Ethereum swap is pushing card prices down even lower.

You only need the silly priced cards if you want to do something like play games on maxed out settings in 4k at a locked 120fps.

[zeppelin101]

But consider the cost of power. For many people, especially Europeans, the power bill from running a gaming PC might be substantially higher than that of running a laptop + Stadia or GeForce Now monthly subscription.

[amluto]

Which indicates that something is wrong with the residential electricity markets. Google should not be paying substantially less for marginal electricity than Google’s customers.

(This is a major problem with California’s energy planning. On the one hand, CA (IMO fairly sensibly) wants users to switch from gas to electricity. On the other hand, CA’s electricity prices are so egregiously inflated that people have an economic incentive to switch from electricity to gas.)

[sofixa]

Google have some datacenters with dedicated renewable power generation (e.g. Belgium) they set up themselves, so it makes sense sometimes their electricity is cheaper.

[nightski]

I'm not sure about in Europe, but in the U.S. at least a substantial portion of power generation is already from renewables. That doesn't really make it free, or necessarily even cheaper depending on the circumstances.

[sofixa]

It makes it cheaper for Google if they build it themselves for their DC than to buy at market rates such as they are today.

[zeppelin101]

> Which indicates that something is wrong with the residential electricity markets. Google should not be paying substantially less for marginal electricity than Google’s customers.

In a more perfect world, that would be the case!

[kjeetgill]

Not at all. We want companies to leverage economies of scale. Efficiency should bring competitive advantage. Google often invests in datacenters in places based around where it's cheaper to power and run them, often owning the energy production.

This is a good thing

[cinntaile]

Often using subsidies and tax advantages so whether it's cheaper overall for society will depend on the cost of these venefits.

[amluto]

But of limited value for a service like Stadia. Power may be cheaper 1000 miles away, but those 1000 miles cost latency.

[morsch]

500W average power draw while running a game

2h average a day playing games

40c/kWh for power

30 * 0.4 * 2 * 0.5 = 12 EUR/month

Stadia Pro was 10 EUR. So you're not wrong, though it's easily within the margin of error for this ballpark estimate (e.g. I wish I still had 14 hours a week for gaming; the power draw could be off by a factor of two in either direction, ...). And in winter, using power for computing is just a roundabout way of heating your living area, so in a way, it's free. I wonder if increased electricity costs were a factor in shutting down Stadia.

[throwaway5959]

Running a mini pc like the Minisforum UM560/UM580 at full tilt is equivalent to running an incandescent light bulb.

[hypertele-Xii]

> equivalent to running an incandescent light bulb.

...which we also no longer have, exactly because they consume too much electricity compared to LEDs.

[throwaway5959]

Honestly if 60 watts is too much, I really hope you’re never getting in a car or on a plane for a holiday.

[hypertele-Xii]

Your hope is validated! I'm one of the greenest, least energy-consuming people on Earth. I live next to a hydro plant with capacity to spare, don't eat meat, don't own a car, have no drivers license, never fly, and my last holiday I cycled 600km [1].

[1] https://hypertele.fi/fbd0998dd2834f08