PDP-6020FD power consumption

The energy consumption of a Pioneer PDP-6020FD was measured using a Kill-A-Watt power meter. The 6020 is a 60" plasma display. The following measurements used the Movie mode, a contrast of 35, and Energy Saver mode 2:

standby:                  0W (Energy Star)
picture off:              69W
Hellboy blu-ray menu:     257W
color bars:               326W
video pattern (IR wipe):  454W
program material:         200W - 400W

The actual standby power usage is about 0.2W which is a finer granularity than the Kill-A-Watt can measure. The picture off setting is from the Tools menu and it blanks the screen to black. The color bars were from a Sony Blu-ray disc (code #7669). The video pattern (IR wipe) is an option in the Pioneer Setup menu that is a bright sweeping vertical bar whose purpose is to erase any image retention on the plasma display. Program material is difficult to measure accurately because of the way a plasma display uses electricity based on each pixels brightness. Very dark scenes can use less than 200W while very bright solid white screens rarely use more than 400W. With Movie mode, a contrast of 35, and Energy Saver mode 2 average program material ranges between 250W to 300W. As a reference the startup menu from the blu-ray disc of Hellboy used 257W.

The Pioneer Kuro 9G has an Energy Saver mode that reduces power consumption and Mode 2 also reduces the panel buzzing sound that bothers some people. The color bar test pattern was used with a couple different Energy Saver modes and the Movie and Optimum AV modes with contrast of 35, 40, and auto. The wattage table is below:

Energy Saver   Movie (c=35)   Movie (c=40)   Optimum
Off            405W           434W           388W
Mode 1         335W           338W           310W
Mode 2         326W           330W           302W

The wattage difference between Energy Saver Off and Mode 2 is about 80W. The watt difference between Mode 1 and Mode 2 is only 8W but interestingly enough that also eliminates the buzzing. The PDP-6020FD becomes quite green consuming only 302W in Energy Saver mode 2 with a color bar test pattern, real program material will average closer to 250W.