P3 International P4460 Kill A Watt EZ Electricity Usage Monitor
by P3 INTERNATIONAL
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List Price: Our Price: $22.41 You Save: $37.54 (63%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $18.00 (click here) Category: Tools See more product details |
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Tools and Hardware Reviews of P3 International P4460 Kill A Watt EZ Electricity Usage Monitor
Customer Review: Handy and interesting
Summary: 4 Stars
This was VERY easy to use. Put in the cents per Kwh (on your bill) and press reset. Plug it in and the calculations are automatic.
I was able to identify that my refrigerator used about $6 / month, but I wasn't about to unplug that.
Most of my chargers used about $.41 per month. They can be unplugged.
My Wii uses 21 watts when turned off if it is on WiiConnect24. Who knew?
The dehumidifier was the real shocker at $46 per month.
A toaster oven uses .07 per hour at 400 deg. F.
Once you know your costs, you will probably not need to use it again. Share the wealth and loan it to all your other techno geek friends.
You get the picture. Easy to use, but if you are testing something that is necessary, you probably won't change your habits and turn it off.
The refrigerator? I will leave that on. But two refrigerators? I might turn the second one off.
Don't buy the cheaper one (p4430?). This one has a battery back up so you can move it to a more convenient location and read the results. It still needs to be plugged into an outlet to read the display.
Customer Review: Great Product!
Summary: 4 Stars
I bought this product because I was curious to see how much it cost to run an oil filled radiator that I use in my office. This tool told me exactly how much it cost to run by running total, minute, hour, day, week and year. The longer you leave something plugged into the device the more statistics it can gather and the more accurate the prediction. I especially like the fact that you can input your own cost per kilowatt hour so you don't have to do the math. As others have said, the screen is not lighted and is hard to read unless you are looking at it straight on or use a flashlight. And it would be nice to have a short cord coming out of it so you don't have to bend down to the outlet to read it. But, I just hooked up a 6 foot grounded extension cord and now I can hold it in my hand. It's really fun to find out how much power things draw and how much it costs to run them each month. I was actually very suprised that my work laptop and 20" LCD monitor only draw 86 watts and only cost me under $4.00 a month to run. Sure beats paying for gas to commute to work. Anyway, even with its' shortcomings, you can't beat what you get for the price.Customer Review: great purchase helps energy reality
Summary: 4 Stars
I bought the Kill-A-Watt EZ to better understand where my electrical energy $$ were being used. While there were some surprises, good and bad, what this device really helped me do was to take a critical look at what wastes my money. A nice surprise was my fairly new refridgerator (4 to 5 yr old Sears); it only costs $65.00 per year. Another surprise, a bad one, was how much it costs to have my VCR, TV, DVD, and cable box turned off but lights or LEDs still on; $36.00 per year. I now have a surge protector and turn everything off at bedtime. Lights and lamps can be a big energy waster. If you pay 10 cents per killowatt it means for every 10 hours a 100watt lamp is on it costs you 10 cents. The new CFL bulbs reduce that cost to 3 cents. Running a faucet till the water is hot, mainly out of habit, is a great waste of money, especially when cold water hand washing works just fine. The main point is that having this meter answers questions and makes you think about your energy use and waste. I like everything about this Kill-A-Watt meter except the display could be a little brighter, hence only a 4-star rating. I recommend it for many reasons.Customer Review: Works for me
Summary: 4 Stars
The monitor arrived as promised in a clam shell package which was more than adequate. As many others have noted, the display is difficult to read while plugged into the wall and it must be plugged in to read. So all I did was plug it into a 4 foot 20 amp extension cord and then plug whatever into the monitor normally. Then problem solved. Although the unit will give you cost / time interval, I was interested in KW / hour as I am trying to trim our total KW's used. So to get this, I entered a cost of $9.99 / KW and then all I needed to do was to move a decimal point to get the KW / hour that I was looking for. I used $9.99 instead of $1.00 because I wanted to be able to get the maximum number of decimal places and even though there is a small variation, the error is acceptable and within a couple of thousandths of a KW. So I guess with round off error, I could just use the $1.00 and be done with it. But I digress... Anyway, I have not had any issues with the monitor yet. I do treat it with TLC since so many others have reported issues with the quality of the unit. From my point of view, it does what it says it does.Customer Review: Kill Some Watts
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a great little product for understanding energy consumption in your home or office. Compare how much a 60 Watt incandecent bulb vs a equivalent brightness CFL bulb uses. Perform an energy analysis on your refrigerator and see what it is costing you per year, month, week, day to run it. Would a new refrigerator be a good investment? Find out which devices in your home are consuming power even when they are off. Plug it into your entertainment center and see how much it costs to run your TV, DVD player, stereo surround system and playstation for a year. Compare the energy used by a laptop vs a desktop computer. The P3 Kill A Watt meter will pay for itself in energy savings.
Tip: To make life easier use the P3 Kill A Watt meter with a 10 or 15 foot extension cord of appropriate gauge for the device being monitored. This makes it easier to read during the monitoring period.
Cannot monitor 240 volt devices with this unit. Use TED - The Energy Detective - [...] to monitor your whole house and determine what your larger appliances such as your water heater, furnace, and dryer are using.