Reducing The Power Consumption Of Overclocked PCs

Now, that must sound pretty inane. Overclocking a PC seems to be as far apart from power saving as it can get. After all, overclockers employ all kinds of power-guzzling methods to improve their CPU's overclockability, from increasing the CPU core voltage to employing more powerful cooling systems. Even the act of increasing the clock speed increases power consumption.

Having overclocked all my PCs for the past 10 years, I am one of these overclockers. I have overclocked everything from a 300 MHz AMD K6-2 processor up to my current gem, an Intel Core 2 Duo E6850. I've even gone to the extent of water cooling almost every processor I've owned since the year 2000. So, the decision to reduce power consumption would seem insane, even to me.

However, there are a few good reasons why I would want to do this. Even though I love overclocking my PCs and making them run to the best of their ability, the increased power consumption has resulted in :

• A very hot room, especially in the afternoon!
• High electricity bill.

In these days of global warming and rising living costs, things can only get worse. Thus, the time has come to reduce my overclocked PC's power consumption. This is the premise for my guide. The point is not to make your PC the most energy-efficient PC out there, but to help you rein in energy costs and high thermal dissipation while letting you enjoy your overclocked PC. Best of all, these tips won't cost you a single cent!

In this guide, we will not just look at theoretical tips on reducing power consumption in overclocked PCs, we will also show you how well they work in real-life situations. Of course, our tests will be based on my overclocked PC so let's take a look at its specifications before we head on to the methods and the test results.