Rated power consumption (Whole system) over time
Power consumption a device was designed or specified to draw, stated without a reproducible workload. This is the usual historic power figure, the Apollo Guidance Computer’s 70 W, a console power-supply rating, and it is neither a cooling-design target nor a measured wall draw, so it is reported but never turned into a multiplier.
- Device scope
- whole-system
- Method
- Rated power
- Plotted in
- watt
Chart
19 figures from 19 machines, spanning 1966 to 2024. The lowest rated power consumption here is 13 W (Sega Mega Drive, 1988) and the highest is 380 W (Sony PlayStation 3, 2006). The two are not divided into a multiple: rated power consumption is not a metric where a ratio means anything. The figures are plotted in W. Points use the release date of the machine the figure belongs to. The table below lists absent figures with their recorded reasons.
Data
| Machine | Released | Figure | Confidence | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apollo Guidance Computer (Block II) Block II flight configuration | 1966 | 70 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Saturn Launch Vehicle Digital Computer Four memory modules | 1966 | 137.0 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Apple Macintosh 128K | January 1984 | 60 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Atari 520ST | June 1985 | 36 W | Vendor-rated provisional | |
| Acorn Archimedes A310 | June 1987 | 100 W | Vendor-rated provisional | |
| Sega Mega Drive | October 1988 | 13 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Commodore Amiga 1200 | October 1992 | 23 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Sega Saturn | November 1994 | 15 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Sony PlayStation | December 1994 | 17 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Sony PlayStation 2 Retail console | March 2000 | 79 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Nintendo GameCube | September 2001 | 39 W | Derived | |
| Sony PlayStation 3 | November 2006 | 380 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Sony PlayStation 4 | November 2013 | 250 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Nintendo Switch | March 2017 | 39 W | Derived | |
| Apple Mac mini (M1, 2020) | November 2020 | 150 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Sony PlayStation 5 Launch console | November 2020 | 350 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Valve Steam Deck | February 2022 | 45 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Raspberry Pi 5 | October 2023 | 25 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Apple Mac mini (M4, 2024) | November 2024 | 155 W | Vendor-rated | |
| Apple II | June 1977 | unknown The manual gives power-supply limits and a minimum-load condition, not a comparable whole-system consumption rating. | not plotted | — |
| Atari 2600 | September 1977 | unknown The reviewed guide gives no whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Atari 800 | November 1979 | unknown The reviewed hardware manual gives no whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| IBM Personal Computer 5150 | August 1981 | unknown The source specifies power-supply limits, not a system consumption rating. | not plotted | — |
| BBC Micro Model B | December 1981 | unknown The documented PSU rail capability is not a whole-system consumption rating. | not plotted | — |
| ZX Spectrum 48K | April 1982 | unknown The source supplies no whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Commodore 64 | August 1982 | unknown The Programmer’s Reference Guide gives no power figure for the machine. The only wattage in it is a resistor rating on a schematic. | not plotted | — |
| MSX | 1983 | unknown No accepted whole-system power rating was located in the data book. | not plotted | — |
| Amstrad CPC 464 | June 1984 | unknown No accepted whole-system power rating was located in the user guide. | not plotted | — |
| Nintendo Entertainment System | October 1985 | unknown Nintendo's table states the console's dimensions and no electrical figure of any kind. | not plotted | — |
| Sega Master System | June 1986 | unknown Sega does state an electrical rating for a Master System — DC9V/850mA — but for the Japanese MK-2000 of October 1987, and the same page sets out how the overseas machine released a year earlier differs in hardware: no FM sound, no 3-D glasses port, no rapid-fire circuit. This record is the 1986 machine, so the vendor figure exists and does not describe it. | not plotted | — |
| Commodore Amiga 500 | 1987 | unknown The Hardware Reference Manual is a programming document and rates no power for the machine; the supply figures in it are for expansion cards drawing from the bus. | not plotted | — |
| NEC PC Engine | October 1987 | unknown The reviewed system-outline manual gives no whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Nintendo Game Boy | April 1989 | unknown The reviewed manual gives no whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| SNK Neo Geo AES | April 1990 | unknown The reviewed manual gives no whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Super Nintendo Entertainment System | August 1991 | unknown Nintendo's table states dimensions, video and audio outputs and no electrical figure of any kind. | not plotted | — |
| Commodore Amiga 4000 | October 1992 | unknown The checked manuals state no whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Nintendo 64 | June 1996 | unknown The programming manual is written for developers and rates no power for the console. | not plotted | — |
| Silicon Graphics Octane | 1997 | unknown A SPEC result reports the hardware and software configuration of the machine under test, not its power rating. SGI’s own hardware documentation for the Octane is not held by any archive this project may cite: what survives of SGI on the Internet Archive is brochures and price lists, and the Octane brochure of December 1999 states the supply voltage and no wattage at all. | not plotted | — |
| Game Boy Advance | March 2001 | unknown Nintendo rates an AC-DC adapter for this handheld at 3 V, 300 mA, but it is an accessory bought separately and the machine ships running on two AA cells. A rating for a power source most units never used is not the console’s rated consumption, and Nintendo publishes no figure for the handheld itself. | not plotted | — |
| Microsoft Xbox | November 2001 | unknown The registered technical source does not yet provide a comparable whole-system rated power figure. | not plotted | — |
| Nintendo DS | November 2004 | unknown The reviewed reference gives no whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Microsoft Xbox 360 | November 2005 | unknown The registered technical source does not yet provide a comparable whole-system rated power figure. | not plotted | — |
| Nintendo Wii | November 2006 | unknown Nintendo's public Wii manuals do not state a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone (1st generation) | June 2007 | unknown Neither cited release states a power figure of any kind for the phone or its charger. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone 3GS | June 2009 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone 4 | June 2010 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Nintendo Wii U | November 2012 | unknown Nintendo's specification table states dimensions, mass, storage, ports and video output, and no power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone 5s | September 2013 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Microsoft Xbox One | November 2013 | unknown The vendor engineers' conference paper on this console describes the system on a chip and states no whole-system power rating; Microsoft published no specification page for the console. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone 6s | September 2015 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone X | November 2017 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone 12 | October 2020 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Microsoft Xbox Series X | November 2020 | unknown Microsoft's full system specifications table states the processor, graphics, memory, storage and I/O and no power figure of any kind. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone 15 Pro | September 2023 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Nintendo Switch 2 | June 2025 | unknown Nintendo's public technical table has no whole-console power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone 17 Pro | September 2025 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
| Apple iPhone 17 | September 2025 | unknown Battery-life durations and charging limits are not a whole-system power rating. | not plotted | — |
Why this chart holds one group only
Every point on a chart is implicitly compared with every other point on it. This chart uses one comparability group: one metric, one device scope, one method . There is no chart of all clock frequencies over time because they are not one quantity.
Points use the release date of the machine a figure belongs to, including figures recorded against a part. A release date applies only to a machine that shipped. What this metric measures.