P3 International P4400 Kill A Watt Electricity Usage Monitor Reviews

• Fascinating gadget

  
  By ADMWYMH11LD27 on 2005-07-09
  I absolutely love this thing.
  
  Having recently moved out on my own, and generally just enjoying statistics in general, I bought this to monitor my electric costs after two high electric bills in a row. The various results I found were quite surprising.
  
  My air purifier, which I bought here on Amazon, uses 85 watts all the time... 85 * 24 hrs * 30 days / 1000 watts = 61.2kWhr * $0.20 = $12.24 a month.
  
  Well, that's quite a costly monthly addition I never thought of. And that's just the begining.
  
  My Vornado fan uses 45w... my air conditioner, on high 6 (out of 12) spikes up to 1200 watts. Jeez.
  
  My computer, at idle with external drives, uses about 250w. When doing extremely intensive things, like encoding a video, 310w.
  
  My light behind my computer desk, with five, 10-watt bulbs, doesn't actually use 50-watts total. No, it uses 50-watts for the bulbs, PLUS 30-watts apparently just for the light unit to function.
  
  You too will find out all these things you never knew, and possibly save money by cutting out, or replacing energy guzzlers.
  
  The product is also made in China. Just like everything else now.
  
  

• How to reduce your power consumption

  
  By A1FMDVOJBAISVM on 2005-11-03
  Two years ago, my electricity consumption jumped about 40% and I ignored the problem until this fall's rate increases. I wanted to find out what I bought back in 2003 that's still eating power today. Enter the P4400 Kill-A-Watt unit, which is the only low-cost product of its type on the market today. I tried but failed to find its specifications online. So I bought a couple of these things to try them out. Here are the details on what it can do.
  
  * How big is the display: 4 digits.
  * What are the front-panel button capabilities: volts, amps, watts, volt-amps, power-factor, frequency (hz), KWH, timer (since reset).
  * Does it lose its data in a power failure: yes.
  * You have to plug the unit into a nonswitched wall outlet, it can't measure overhead lighting or large appliances.
  * It will report the amount of time (hours:min up to 99:59, then hours for about a year) since last reset but won't tell you how much of that time the attached device was powered on.
  
  How did I figure out usage? I created an Excel spreadsheet with the following columns: Device, estimated wattage, estimated hours/month, kilowatts avg/month, measured kwh/day, measured kilowatts, annual cost. I went through the house and inventoried everything I could find, entering it into a row of the spreadsheet. Then I filled in the estimates:
  
  - Hours/month: if I use a TV 3 hours a day, I enter the formula 3*365/12; if I use a treadmill 45 minutes on 10 days a month, the formula is 0.45*10*365/12.
  - Kilowatts (average over the month): formula is watts*hours/(24*365/12)/1000. If you have a 60-watt light left on 24/7, you should see the value 0.060; if you have it on a 12-hour timer, you should see the value 0.030.
  - Annual cost: formula is kilowatts*365*24*cost. Locally the cost is 13.5 cents so a 100-watt device works out to $118.26 per year.
  
  OK once I have that chart I then plug in the Kill-A-Watt to measure the items that might be chewing up more power than my estimates. For a device that you leave on all the time and which uses a steady number of watts, you can simply measure it for a moment and enter the kwh/day figure into your spreadsheet quickly. For devices like refrigerators or computer monitors or TV sets, you will want to leave the unit plugged in anywhere from a day to a week before entering your kwh/day figure.
  
  The first thing that leaped out at me was how much it costs to run those econo-box desktop PCs. Sure enough, the culprit turned out to be those hot AMD and Intel processors: the tech industry wants you to focus on gigahertz and other performance numbers; they'll never tell you how many watts the computer will draw--because no one asks, not even Consumer Reports. A modern desktop easily draws 100 watts: refer to my earlier figure to see how much that costs, a dollar amount bound to go up in the future. Laptops would save power (though not necessarily enough to make up for the purchase price). Turning off the PC when not in use would save money, but at the cost of productivity: if you value your time, you don't like waiting 2 minutes every time you want to check an email (add those 2 minutes up over the course of a year!)
  
  Bottom line: the Kill-A-Watt device will focus your attention on some of the devices that are costing you unnecessary money, and will definitely change the questions you will be asking as you purchase future household devices. I'd like to see a more feature-laden version, but not if it makes the Kill-A-Watt cost much more than the $25 I paid.
  
  

• Excellent Product!

  
  By A1CEYM9QEHWA42 on 2004-08-20
  I absolutely love this product, it's one of the best devices I've aquired in a long time. When I purchased it a few years ago, I paid close to $50, but it was worth every penny. Some of my joy from using the device simply comes from the fact that I'm curious how much energy the products in my home use (I now know, for instance, that my cable box uses 15W of energy whether it is on or off, at that it wastes a little more than 10 kilowatt hours each month, or that my fridge uses 350W when on, or that my laptop only uses 40W - a useful fact to know when I went to buy an inverter to use it in my car), but it can also be used to save energy (I found that hitting the switch on the surge supressors of my computers at night can save me almost $5 a month off my electric bill). Additionally, it's interesting to find out where all the power you use goes, and even what members of the family use the most electricity (you could do a side by side comparason of a child's computer with yours).
  
  Even though I've had my Kill-A-Watt for years, I still take it out regularly to test any new equipment in my home. I know my cell phone charger uses 4 W, my regular battery charger 5 W, and my IC3 15 minute battery charger 73 W.
  
  Surely most will not have as much fun with this unit as I do, but it can be both practical and enjoyable for people such as myself or those looking to save some money off their electric bill. It's also an asset for anyone off-grid, who is generating their power with solar energy or by other renewable means.
  
  

• Works, but could be much more useable

  
  By A2YWEG35UMPBJ3 on 2007-04-15
  This little guy does what it's supposed to do. The amount of information you gather with it and what you do with that information is up to you. I commend anyone who takes energy conservation seriously enough to use this device and modify his usage based on what he learns. I've been energy-conscious for years, so I haven't come across any new ways to reduce my electric usage, but maybe I will some day. I did learn that once I turn a fan on the speed doesn't have much affect on the power consumed, so I've turned one up now. I guess that means the Kill A Watt has encouraged me to use more electricity. LOL I also used it to check the voltage drop when I turned a high wattage device on, which was interesting.
  
  One of the more interesting experiments I did with it was to test the power consumption of my audio system. Amplifiers are labeled with the standard power consumption labels, but their actual power consumption varies significantly depending on the volumes they have to reproduce. So I plugged the Panamax that protects the front end of my A/V system into the Kill A Watt (the side and rear amps are on other outlets) and found that even though I have three 200-watt amplifiers rated labeled as using about 300 watts each, and a powered sub with a 400-watt amplifier labeled as using 600 watts, I couldn't get the actual power usage up much over 500 watts while watching U-571 (which makes serious use of a subwoofer) at volumes no one would ever tolerate if I had guests, and that includes powering the display and my digital processor. At normal volume levels, I was looking at peaks of around 350 watts.
  
  But here's why I knocked it two stars:
  
  - The prongs on the back are so high that the bottom of the unit blocks the lower receptacle of an outlet if you plug the Kill A Watt in the upper receptacle. If they'd reversed the vertical offsets of the prongs on the back and the receptacle on the front you could use the bottom receptacle while this is plugged in the top.
  
  - The display is on the front of the unit. Since most receptacles are 18" or so off the floor, this means you pretty much have to get on your hands and knees to read the thing. It would have been much better had the display been at a 45 degree angle so you could read it comfortably while looking down on it.
  
  Both of the previous two issues go away if you use a good extension cord to connect the Kill A Watt to the outlet, but both could have been addressed by simple design changes.
  
  - As someone else noted, there is no backlighting, so for many uses a flashlight will come in handy, especially if you don't use an extensions cord.
  
  So with three very minor design changes it would have been a lot more convenient to use.
  
  - I think it's overpriced. Designing a device like this doesn't require an electrical engineering degree. A kid with an interest in electronics could do it and it can't cost more than $2 to make in China. They probably justify the price on the premise that it will save you a lot of money, but realistically you can save just about as much using common sense and turning stuff off or unplugging it when you aren't using it. (If it's warm when you aren't using it, it's wasting energy.) Also, this only works with things you can plug into an outlet. If you're looking to save energy, remember that there are lots of devices in most homes that won't work with this, such as room lighting, outdoor lighting, heat pumps, water heaters, ceiling fans, and so on.
  
  I have learned some very interesting things with it, but nothing yet I can use to save me money. Your mileage may vary.
  
  

• Great Fun for Obessive Compulsive People

  
  By A11Y74GVJ27NWJ on 2006-02-12
  If you are a "Miser," this device will be your best friend. I bought the "Kill-A-Watt" because I suspected that our old Fridge was shooting up the electric bill. I plugged the Fridge into the meter and left it for 3 days. I was very surprised to find out the the fridge was only burning about 1.5 KWH (Kilowatt Hours) per day, which is about what it should.
  
  Now I am going around the house and plugging other appliances in for a couple days. The real shocker was that my "economical" eMachines PC along with a CRT monitor was using more energy than the fridge! The computer was burning almost 2 KWH per day. I made changes to the energy saver software in Windows, so that the monitor automatically shuts off in 10 minutes and the computer hibernates in 1 hour. This has brought the daily consumption down to 1 KWH.
  
  For those of you who don't understand KWH, its a measurement of electric usage by the power company. To be simple, using a KWH is about .08¢ in our area. So, if you save 1 KWH per day, you save .08¢ After a month's time, it's about $2.48. After a year it's about $30 bucks. The savings add up over time.
  
  With the Kill-A-Watt, I've found out lots of interesting things:
  
  My Mac Mini with a LCD monitor uses about 1/2 the power of my eMachines Tower with CRT. That's 70 Watts vs. 140 Watts.
  
  My Electric Blanket which I though was "economical" pulls 120 Watts during operation. It actually uses 1 KWH per day. I even found out that the blanket burns 10 Watts when the power switch is off!
  
  I found many "power bandits" in my home. These are devices like cellphones, scanners, routers, modems that have those little black power blocks. Most of these devices use 5 to 10 watts with the power switch off. With the Kill-A-Watt, I was able to find the biggest offenders and plug them into a timer that shuts off each night when they are not in use.
  
  If you are truly obsessive about your electrical bill like me, you can make a nice Excel spreadsheet with all your appliances. You can enter Watts, Kilowatt Hours, Price per hour and than figure if replacing a device would pay for the purchase and how long it will take.
  
  As everyone says in their reviews, "This device will pay for it's self."
  
  
• Works Well
  By A33FZZ8LHG3F7D on 2005-09-16
  This is a nice little meter. It measures Volts, Amps, PowerFactor, Watts, VA, KWH and Elapsed Time in use. I got it to survey my house loads for a potential solar system and it performed very well. I could plug a device in to it for a week and figure out what the average power consumption was. I couldn't believe how bad the power factor is on my window swamp cooler.
  
  The addition of a pigtail would be nice because it is hard to see behind furniture and it is so big that it uses an entire outlet while in use. A 240V mode would be nice also.
  
  It worked better then I had expected.
  
  
  
  
• Works as Advertised
  By A1RDHBBZE1NPS3 on 2004-09-29
  I have had one of these for 3 months and it has worked very well. I started by testing 60W and 30W bulbs and the meter gives me a dead on accurate wattage reading so I assume that the wattage that it reads for my fridge and other items is accurate.
  I next started to use the unit to gather data on how much power my home devices where using and locating which items where power hogs, one great surprise was that my Ceiling fans use about 1/3 the power of my Bedroom AC units! If most people realized that the power consumption was that high they would probably not install them. After testing I decided that the cooling effect VS $$ it was a better value to go back to using my AC.
  For people who are using Solar Energy or RV owners this gadget is very handing for mapping out your power use, just keep in mind that it only reads 110/120 volt devices
  
  
  
  
• "Kill-a-Watt" Electricity Usage meter
  By A3VHEI1YFR0K4N on 2005-09-17
  This piece of test equipment has just saved me hundreds of dollars by avoiding our purchase of a new freezer. While our chest type freezer is over 25 years old my wife and I suspected that it was the cause of our high electric bills. However after monitoring it for a number of days with this meter we discovered that the power it was taking to run it was very nominal and there would be no payback for at least 10 years to replace it with a new one.
  
  
• Great Gadget, Excellent for for Monitoring Energy Usage
  By A33ZYFE8XMKKR1 on 2006-01-16
  
  There were two primary reasons that I purchased the Kill-A-Watt: 1) to measure the [questionable] energy savings performance of the Power Planner by Energy Smart (see review) 2) to disprove the stated 2900 Watts on my Bellissima Ionic Volcano Hair Dryer (see review). Tertiary reasons included a general interest in energy savings. As it turns out, the Kill-A-Watt demonstrated that both aforementioned devices did not live up to stated manufacturer claims.
  
  The Kill-A-Watt plugs into any typical grounded three-prong receptacle. It also has a receptacle so it acts as a splice, presumably measuring voltage and current to determine power in watts (ohm's law V=IR, Power=VI). In addition to measuring power, voltage and current in real-time, it can also measure kilowatt hours (kwh), via an imbedded timer. This unit, kwh, is the measure by which your electric utility company bills you.
  
  In general, the Kill-A-Watt is extremely easy to use. There is a large LCD display indicating the value of interest. The digital readout and buttons make it extremely easy to navigate through the various functions.
  
  Particularly interesting is observing the difference between the stated wattages and realized wattages of various consumer devices. It is also interesting to watch the energy creep caused by thermal factors (in p=ir^2). FYI, for typical resistive elements "R" goes up as temperature increases.
  
  As you can see, the Kill-A-Watt allowed me to disprove various manufacturer claims.
  
  Measured Wattages:
  
  Belissma 2900 Watt Hair Dryer
  Ionic Hair Dryer (aka Volcano) ...1525 Watts
  ConAir 1875.............................1515
  Hair Made 1875........................1540
  Andis ProStyle .........................1250
  
  Other Consumer Devices:
  Heated Towel Warmer (stated 100 watts)....... 131
  
  Lights:
  Sunbox Sunray Full Spectrum Lightbox (stated 120 watts)....123 watts
  Lights of America Fluorex Outdoor Lamp (stated 65 watts).....65 watts
  Lightwitz 30 watt light bulb..... 30 watts
  Lights of America 200 Watt Equivalent Compact Fluorescent (stated 42 watts)....45 Watts
  
  It is important to note that the Power Planner by EnergySmart was intended to save money on devices with older electric motors. In my review of the Power Planner, I outlined the test results using the device on my parents 40+ year old secondary refrigerator. Sadly, the Kill-A-Watt showed that there was no realized difference using the Power Planner over multiple 24 hour periods.
  
  If you have any interest in energy conservation/savings or are questioning manufacturer claims, I would highly recommend that you purchase the Kill-A-Watt. It is great for measuring instantaneous power, current and voltage, but also power consumption over a period of time.
  
  
  
• Don't Buy this version
  By A1OC2T1L59N2AV on 2007-10-29
  Make sure you get the other version of this product. This version (the 4400) does not calculate electricity costs!!!
  
  The 4600 (or EZ) version is much more useful as it projects your electricity costs.
  
  
  
• THIS SAVED ME $35.00 A MONTH
  By A33HS35I8A79AI on 2005-12-27
  I bought this and figured out my 25 year old refrigerator was using over $50.00 a month on electricity. I went out and bought a new refrigerator that only uses $15.00 a month. Now I am saving $420.00 a year on electricity. THIS IS A MUST HAVE DEVICE.
  
  
• Kill a Watt Meter
  By A2GIJ1FM1U4Q6M on 2005-09-29
  Inexpensive but full featured product which seems well made. Excellent for ad-hoc metering of electrical consumption of most appliances & electronics. I purchased it to measure consumption of the amplification & lighting equipment used by our six member band. Also to test the voltage at the various places we perform. Much cheaper than the "Professional" power strips costing $100 + which do the same thing.
  
  
• Works as expected
  By AW3QV56MHD62U on 2005-09-01
  Plug it in and then plug in your device and it'll tell you how many watts it's using. Leave it plugged in and it'll tell you how many Killowatt hours you spend on that device, on average. This is useful for finding out how much your computer is using, for example. I found that my main computer varies from about 100 watts to 250 watts depending on what I'm doing. I also noticed that even when it's turned off it uses 15 watts of power.
  If I could find any negatives it's: 1) can't do 220 Volt outlets 2) can't download the information to a computer. 3) have to turn off the device to plug it in. i.e. I have to turn off my computer, plug it in to Kill-a-watt and then plug that into the wall.
  But I knew these things before hand.
  
  
• Poor form factor, no backlighting - otherwise does what it should
  By A1TTGSJMC6TTS0 on 2006-05-26
  Like most of the other reviewers, I got it because I was interested in knowing how much power my applicances were using, in real life. Most of them will tell you the AC voltage, frequency and power requirements when turned on (look for a label on the back if metal or for the information to be molded into the plastic), but in real life, appliances are turned on and off all the time, either manually (by the user) or automatically (by themselves). For example, in a modern fridge, the compressor will turn on and off throughout the day. It will cycle on/off more frequently in warm weather, and when the door is open. My fridge uses about 650 watts when the compressor is on, and only 30 when it's off. Clearly, you can't just pick one or the other, so you have to average over a time period.
  
  In order to accurately measure true usage, in daily life, you need one of these. You just plug the applicance into it, plug the meter into the wall, and come back in a day (or week), to get a better picture of what's really gobbling power in your house.
  
  My only gripes are:
  
  1. as others have pointed out, it is big, and you can't plug anything else into a duplex outlet with it. (It's also got a ground plug, so you can't plug it directly into an older-style two-prong outlet, but grounding is a good thing, so I can't complain.)
  
  2. although it powers itself by tapping off a little power from the outlet, I think it would have been very convenient if it included a little backlighting (of course, in order not to draw too much power, and mess up the readings it's taking, it should only come on when you press a button, then go out again five seconds later). Outlets are generally close to the floor, frequently behind furniture, and generally out of the way. Once you unplug the meter, the information is lost, so I often found myself on my hands and knees, shining a flashlight at it from an oblique angle (so as not to shine right through the LCD display). Seems like an obvious enhancement that would really make a difference.
  
  3. It would be useful if it could handle 240volts, for electric dryers, but that's a minor point, since the dryer is on when it's on, and off when it's not, so it's completely different from a fridge.
  
  All in all, a useful product, though I think once you've done an initial survey of your house, you won't use it again until you get a new appliance.
  
  
• Neat Gadget
  By A1QRUMZRWUEWEK on 2004-04-24
  If you are looking to cut down on electricity costs or worried that leaving your computer on all the time is expensize, let this device do the math for you. It will help find those appliances that you suspect are wasting electrity and then you decide whether it is worth keeping them plugged in or not.

  Just because your tv is not turned on does not mean it is not using power and that blinking 12:00 on your vcr is eating juice as we speak.
  
  

• Great gadget to have around
  By A33D1JPVGOO9UM on 2006-06-12
  This is great - it did live up to my expectations, and at about $30, it's definitely a great buy.
  
  This shows the volts, amperes, watt, KHW, line frequency, and so on. The power consumption is the best feature - it leads to quite a few pleasant and unpleasant surprises! It was great to find, for instance, that the tower fans use under 50 watts - compared to a 1200-watt AC, that's a great savings! However, it was not-so-nice to see that my hair dryer consumes close to 1800 watts with the heat on high.
  
  While not a terribly cost-saving device by itself - it will have an effect on your power consumption, and may lead to smaller power bills. At least it tells you how much power your gadgets consume, unlike the packaging which is often misleading and rarely contain the power rating.
  
  As another reviewer mentioned, desktop computers were the biggest surprise - with a core duo churning out Seti at Home work units, I was surprised to see it's costing me about 300 watts an hour, or about $27 a month - whereas, using the PC for just 4 hours a day for my personal use, I end up with less than $5 a month! Ouch!
  
  My only complaint - this unit has only one outlet, but is designed in such a way that it guards both the outlets on the wall. That means, I run one outlet short of what I had before. Of course, I can buy a outlet duplicator from the dollar store and put it on this, but it would have been nice if this just took the space of a single outlet - just shifting the prongs a half-inch towards the edge would have solved the issue.
  
  
• fun little geek toy, great for tightwads, useful for accounting too.
  By A2QAQ2EEMIL09V on 2006-03-22
  I own two of these toys. I bought my first to run around the house measuring power consumption of my other toys. It was very useful for reducing my home energy consumption, which i did by almost 50%, without suffering. I bought the second so that i could, in combination with my first unit and some good power strips, meter all power consumed by my home office (It is not in proportion to the square feet of my home office/total sqft, the usual metric used in accounting). The added electricity savings of knowing what my high consumption appliances really were, paid for the first unit in a week. My tax savings generated by accounting for my office's true power consumption paid for the second unit in 2 months. My only complaint is that I can't reset them without unplugging them.
  
  
• Very Handy Gadget
  By A1X8UQ5A7WZHDO on 2005-02-19
  Want to know how much current a device uses? What about the wattage, voltage etc? Plug the Kill-a-Watt into a power outlet and then plug in the device you want to measure. You can select to measure voltage, current, wattage, volt amps, Hertz, power factor or kWh. The maximum current is 15 amps. A very easy to use, accurate and inexpensive piece of electrical test equipment.
  
  
• Amazing little gadget
  By A395SP44371UC7 on 2006-01-02
  Just a few years ago a power analyzer with the capabilities of the Kill a Watt would have cost hundreds if not thousands of dollars. I was blown away when I found I could get such a cool little toy for under $30. Since I recieved mine I've been going around the house plugging everything I can find into it, in some cases I was pleasantly surprised and found that the average energy consumption of some devices is considerably less than the peak listed on the rating label. In other cases though I was not so lucky. The TV, stereo, computer equipment and everything else that remains at least partially on all the time all adds up to a scary amount over time.
  
  I'd recommend this unit to anyone concerned about their energy use. The cumulative killowatt-hours counter is very useful for any device which draws a variable amount of power over time and will show at a glance how many KWA it has consumed in a given period. Then all you need to do is multiply that by the cost per KWA your electric company bills you and you instantly know how much that appliance just cost you to run.
  
  For the more advanced users out there, this unit is also capable of measuring volt-amps and power factor which I've found very useful in my experiments with discharge lamps and ballasts, but these features are probably of little use to the layman.
  
  
• I LOVE This Gadget, Great for Monitoring Energy Usage
  By A33ZYFE8XMKKR1 on 2006-01-16
  There were two primary reasons that I purchased the Kill-A-Watt: 1) to measure the [questionable] energy savings performance of the Power Planner by Energy Smart (see review) 2) to disprove the stated 2900 Watts on my Bellissima Ionic Volcano Hair Dryer (see review). Tertiary reasons included a general interest in energy savings. As it turns out, the Kill-A-Watt demonstrated that both aforementioned devices did not live up to stated manufacturer claims.
  
  The Kill-A-Watt plugs into any typical grounded three-prong receptacle. It also has a receptacle so it acts as a splice, presumably measuring voltage and current to determine power in watts (ohm's law V=IR, Power=VI). In addition to measuring power, voltage and current in real-time, it can also measure kilowatt hours (kwh), via an imbedded timer. This unit, kwh, is the measure by which your electric utility company bills you.
  
  In general, the Kill-A-Watt is extremely easy to use. There is a large LCD display indicating the value of interest. The digital readout and buttons make it extremely easy to navigate through the various functions.
  
  Particularly interesting is observing the difference between the stated wattages and realized wattages of various consumer devices. It is also interesting to watch the energy creep caused by thermal factors (in p=ir^2). FYI, for typical resistive elements "R" goes up as temperature increases.
  
  As you can see, the Kill-A-Watt allowed me to disprove various manufacturer claims.
  
  Measured Wattages:
  
  Belissma 2900 Watt Hair Dryer
  Ionic Hair Dryer (aka Volcano) ...1525 Watts
  ConAir 1875.............................1515
  Hair Made 1875........................1540
  Andis ProStyle .........................1250
  
  Other Consumer Devices:
  Heated Towel Warmer (stated 100 watts)....... 131
  
  Lights:
  Sunbox Sunray Full Spectrum Lightbox (stated 120 watts)....123 watts
  Lights of America Fluorex Outdoor Lamp (stated 65 watts).....65 watts
  Lightwitz 30 watt light bulb..... 30 watts
  Lights of America 200 Watt Equivalent Compact Fluorescent (stated 42 watts)....45 Watts
  
  It is important to note that the Power Planner by EnergySmart was intended to save money on devices with older electric motors. In my review of the Power Planner, I outlined the test results using the device on my parents 40+ year old secondary refrigerator. Sadly, the Kill-A-Watt showed that there was no realized difference using the Power Planner over multiple 24 hour periods.
  
  If you have any interest in energy conservation/savings or are questioning manufacturer claims, I would highly recommend that you purchase the Kill-A-Watt. It is great for measuring instantaneous power, current and voltage, but also power consumption over a period of time.
  
  
  
• You may be surprised to learn what uses electricity: I was.
  By A1W0RJHDCLPD3W on 2006-11-10
  I plugged my Kill-a-Watt into my stereo and TV system. With the TV on and all the components (receiver, cable box, TiVo and a couple other gadgets) I was amazed to see that it drew almost 300W! I started turning things off and while the TV was a lot the one that amazed me was the cable box, which runs 24 hours a day and drew over 100W!
  
  The freezer in the basement was also a surprise. Flat screen monitors are vastly better than CRTs. Some things we heard were bad aren't really significant (some of those "vampire" transformers have tiny usage compared to a simple thing like replacing an incandescent light bulb in a lamp with a compact florescent bulb.
  
  My only gripe with this device is that it covers both plugs in regular duplex receptacle, and because it's bulky doesn't fit in all places and you have to get into tight places sometimes to read the measurements. They should just add a three foot extension cord which would solve these problems. So once I did this, the problem was solved.
  
  Through awareness, I have been able to understand how turning off the TV completely, and a few other minimal changes can make a significant difference.
  
  
• You need this.
  By A17GMJQYRRTYU0 on 2007-04-20
  Love it!! Awesome simple little device. Opens your eyes to many things we take for granted. Electric bill was way too high and kept getting higher. Called electric company and told them to do actual reading not estimated usage. Still was high. Got this device and began connecting everything to it and was shocked. So many things that we think is off is constantly drawing power. With this device and now using better energy habits, like putting things on power strips with on/off switches, helped reduce Kwh down 50%. Cable box uses 13W while off. Same with my audio system. Just displaying the clock on the audio system while off was using bloody 22W!!
  
  Using the specs on the back of most items just lists the max input values but really they don't use it all. My cable modem which I thought was 60W (Label said 0.5A at 120V) was really using 3W.
  
  I even switched all my appliances to different switches on my house and turned off extra switches not really being used. I have 6 switches and currently just using 3 now. Sad thing is I found that one switch has like 80% of all electrical power. Really bad installation IMO. Lucky all appliances just use 9A on this 15A switch.
  
  I was originally planning on building one of these devices myself since I found plans with all the specs to build one. But in reality, you need to buy all the parts mostly in bulk so it will come out more than if you have all the parts lying around. I was even considering making a real dangerous and cheap one buy splicing a power cord, attaching a resistor and connecting it to my multimeter, but for $23 was worth not putting my life and my components at risk. About the design yes really dumb if you connect it directly to the wall. USE A POWER CABLE for that. Like those AC power cables should be fine.
  
  Some findings-
  Switch light bulbs from incandescent to fluorescent: 535W down to 143W
  Computer and Monitor will be shutoff at power strip when not used. Saving 5W
  Keep Printer, USB Hub, HDD enclosure, Wireless AP on separate power strip and only turn on when needed. Saving 9W
  
  I even made an Excel sheets with all values, made charts and mapped switches in the house. If you love playing with numbers this is gonna be addicting.
  
  
  
• Brings your purchases into reality
  By A2SBFXPN5V6A6X on 2007-08-13
  Our summer electric bill at my old home (built in the 80's) located in So Ca. hovered over $800 a MONTH! EEK! Our new home with it's enhanced insulation and double pane glass though double the size averages around $450.00 per month. Still, with gas prices and a new baby I figured this would be a pretty good time to see if I could save further as well as make a difference for the environment.
  
  Basically this unit plugs into a power outlet and whatever electrical device you want to meter plugs into this unit. The results are immediate. Keep in mind though that this will not calculate the actual cost of the electricity being used, only the amount of electricity being used and then you will have to use the going rate off your power bill to calculate the cost.
  The unit works great though I would recommend an extension cord to plug into at times as it can be a tad difficult to read in tight places as the screen does not light up.
  
  I suppose I could be considered a techno nut with all of the latest in gadgets and so I decided to start there as I hear and read so much of wasted electricity going to electronic devices that are turned off.
  
  So what did I find?
  All of these were tested while OFF.
  The Klipse Ipod kitchen unit uses 12watts.
  32" LCD office tv uses 15watts.
  27" LCD Xbox 360 monitor (12watts)
  50" HD Panasonic plasma(9 watts)
  60" HD Sony LED TV (8 watts)
  30" Dell computer monitor (0 watts!)
  22" garage LCD tv (5watts)
  42" downstairs plasma (11watts)
  Again, be mindful that the above is pulling power when switched off. A little surprising for sure and all of them are listed as Energy Star! I have other electronics such as a few more monitors in the house that I do not use often and so I simply put them on a switch where I turned them off.
  
  Though I would not call it fun, it is interesting to check the electrical pull of various items throughout the house and one finds themselves running around the house to see what they can plug into next. My aquarium? How about 65 watts of continuous power. Anyone want to come over to have fish for dinner?
  
  The screen readout is very small and difficult to read but is workable. One can switch between volts,watts, Amps per hour,etc.. with just a press of a button.
  Unit appears to be built pretty well so no concerns there.
  
  Other readings:
  My hi end customer gaming computer rig with the best of everything, 580watts! Eeek! Editing videos is more expensive than I once thought.
  My large compressor in the garage (400watts) when on.
  50" plasma (355 watts!), Panasonic makes the best plasmas but eat up a lot of juice.
  60" Sony TV (198 watts)
  My total theater room entertainment center (lights, 60" tv, Denon 3808 A/V receiver , PS3(Blue-Ray), 590watts! EEEK!
  The stuff adds up quick.
  
  With this unit I was able to reduce my summer average bill by $29.00 a month without any sacrifice in my quality of living by simply unplugging devices that are seldom used. Now of course TV's are difficult at this as you would have to input the new settings each time. But other devices can simply be unplugged to save a bit of money and help out the environment though yes I agree I use a bit more than the average person I suppose.
  
  This is also a good device to compare various items if shopping.
  
  I would highly recommend this unit to everyone and can say that it has paid for itself in just the first month by reducing wasted power consumption in my house.
  
  
  
• very poor form factor
  By A1XE12PGTI9TBY on 2006-02-05
  I spent the morning using this and the results were useful. For example, there's a stereo that will now remain unplugged instead of off.
  
  In using this at every location I found its shape awkward. Not only does it take up all the plugs below it and off to the sides its just large enough to take up the area above it. There were a couple of powerstrips where it took up the whole thing. This is inconvenient for a quick test and very inconvenient for an extended one.
  
  Unlike others I don't expect to use it much after this initial burst. I hope others at my job will want to borrow it.
  
  
• easily finds wasted energy
  By A3C32Q95RW6YWM on 2006-08-19
  This is a must have tool. It is very easy to use.
  
  All most every electronic device in your home will use power if it is plugged into a live outlet, even though it is turned off. This power use is known as "phantom power". The phantom power comes from the component of the device that converts AC current into DC current. All electrical processing devices use DC current... like a cell phone. Try testing the power cord that connects to your cell phone. Then disconnect the power cord from the cell phone and notice the power cord is still sucking power from the outlet. The Kill-A-Watt will allow you to find and determine how much phantom power a device consumes instantaneously or over a period of time.
  
  On that note, a simple cure is to plug in the electrical devices to a switchable power strip and turn of the power strip.
  
  Conservation is key!
  
  
• not what you think
  By A1KHT26K4U8IO8 on 2005-09-07
  DON'T BUY THIS...I read the review and thought this would save me work and some math, I was wrong. This product reads like it will calculate your power usage (hour, day, week, etc.) it doesn't they don't even give you the formulas to figure out the information the "large LCD" gives you. SAVE YOUR MONEY, the power usage numbers that come with the product will serve you just as well
  
  
• Beware of misleading descriptions
  By A1CGTOUKHJ9EBU on 2006-01-08
  This is a great device and works well.
  
  However, I think the product description and some of the reviews are a little misleading. From the information, I would have thought this device had a place to plug in my electricity cost, and then it would actually show me the COST of usage.
  
  It does not do that. If you leave it plugged in, it will show you a running total of how many kilowatt-hours have been used, along with the time that's it's taken to use them. That's it. You still have to take that kilowatt-hours and time, and crunch it manually against your electric bill's rates, to find the actual cost for a given period.
  
  This makes sense, in a way, since appliances such as refrigerators, that cycle on and off, need to see an average over time -- an instantaneous readout doesn't tell you anything.
  
  However, it would have been really nifty if you could plug in YOUR cost of electricity, and have it show you the daily/monthly/yearly cost of running the device automatically. This device, again, will NOT go that far.
  
  Having said that, it's still a pretty cool device. It does show both watts and amps, along with the aforementioned cumulative kilowatt-hours. Less useful is the volts and frequency readouts -- geez, if it doesn't read something close to 120V/60Hz, you've got a problem! It's not like those readouts are going to be changing a lot.
  
  Worth the money, for the curious. Just don't expect it to do TOO much.
  
  
• Not bad for the price, but accuracy not even close to 0.2%
  By AYZ08PRDOFTHV on 2008-05-15
  I used a Fluke AC power logger to compare. The P4400 read 9% too high for a refrigerator and 11% too low for a PC. (This was done using the clamp current probes on the fluke meter so their claimed accuracy is 1%.) The P4400 seems to read within 2% for purely resistive loads like a fanless space heater. It appears to be more accurate when power factor is near 1, but it is definitely not 0.2% accurate.
  
  
• Great Gadget
  By ASGNAQTS0AXYE on 2007-01-11
  Easy to use and understand. Now when I look at electrical appliances in my house I see dollar signs. You will make up the cost of the item in your electric bill in the first month.
  
  
• No Data Storage Is a BIG PROBLEM
  By A2H44J4XAMBVYE on 2007-03-13
  Others have noted the same thing -- you can only read the output when the unit is plugged in, which is often in a hard-to-read location. A backlit screen would help greatly, but even better would be a memory function to enable reading the data after the unit is disconnected. If anyone knows of another product with that ability, please mention it! Thanks.
  
  Otherwise functionality is good. A 220V appliance version would also be very useful.
  
  

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• Smart Strip LCG3 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology
• P3 International P4460 Kill A Watt EZ Electricity Usage Monitor
• Smart Strip SCG3/049418906 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology
• Power Strip Liberator