I’m sure all of you know plugged-in appliances slowly run up your electric bill. The annoyance of having to unplug/plug devices is enough to just ignore the whole problem altogether. The Belkin TimeOutlet concept is a modular, stackable surge protector divided into 4 quadrants. Each section corresponds to a time of day. When that time is over, power is cut from everything in that quadrant and power turns on in the next.
In theory I like the idea since most of my appliances do tend to operated only at certain hours of the day. What I don’t like is the design. The stackable modular system looks like it can get ridiculously tall, especially for an area like the entertainment center. I tend to hide my surge protectors, not bring attention to them. A good idea nonetheless but I prefer a less “band-aid” approach to energy conservation. Manufacturers need to include circuity that enables people to totally, 100% turn off the power of any device instead of having it sit in some standby, limbo power mode.
Designers: Hoang M Nguyen, Anh Nguyen & Sam Staar
Another approach would have a house with special sockets throughout. When a person leaves the house, he could flip this switch off, and all sockets context sensitive on this switch would turn off as well.
I think making it time-based makes the individual have to do mental arithmetic, and occasionally re-configure these sockets. The fact that there is a “constant” switch acknowledges this need.
Manufacturers are already moving to reduce standby current to near zero. That’s the best solution.
Sounds like a great idea in priciple but what happens to items that need to be on constantly?like the freezer or boiler.
Sounds like a great idea in principle but what happens to things that need to be switched on all the time?such as boilers and freezers.
so don’t use this for those stuffs. Stupido!
that is cool idea.the jack is on the top,that maybe is not easy for anti-dust and sand…need a cover
I love it.
So if they’re all stacked up like that, do they all switch at the same time?
Have you ever noticed in a power outage, the freezer maintains for hours? I had my freezer on a timer. I could have it off overnight and back on on the morning.