I have an HP g3 mini and a Dell Optiplex flying around, both similarly specced. The HP has an i5 6500t and 16gb DDR4 RAM, the Dell has 8gb DDR3l, so nothing too different.
However, the Dell draws around 15W while idle, the HP one 5W.
The only difference I could think of (and that is in my power to change) is the PSU. The Dell has one of those SFF PSU for up to 180W while the HP has an external 65W power brick with a barrel jack.
So my question is: Does anyone have experience with one of those Pico PSUs? I guess they should be more efficient? I’m not planning to put anything power hungry into the optiplex.
10w is ± 87kwh/year. Depending on your electricity cost, it would take 1 to 5 years to gain anything from switching to a picopsu, that’s it if you even manage to gain 10w, which is not a certainty.
If you really care about those 10w watts, selling the optiplex and getting a second G3 would be a better option I think.