Legit Mods and Ends Reviews

Cisco Linksys EA6500 Smart Wi-Fi Router Review

Manufacturer: Cisco Linksys
Product: Linksys EA6500
Date: Fri, Nov 23, 2012 - 12:00 AM
Written By: Ken Brown -
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Linksys EA6500 – Power Consumption

Cisco Linksys EA6500 Smart Wi-Fi Router
Power consumption by your home’s electronic devices continues to be a very important issue so we have made an attempt to present some simple power consumption tests on the various routers that we had. To measure idle usage, we reset each wireless router to the default settings and plugged them with no devices connected to them. We then measured the power draw from each router at the wall with our P3 International P4400 Kill-A-Watt electric usage monitor.


Router Power Consumption
Benchmark Results: Power Consumption for the Linksys EA6500 measured about the middle of the road for wireless-ac routers.  The 9.7 Watts used is the same power usage that our Buffalo and Netgear AC routers used.  It is interesting to note how much hungrier these 802.11ac networking devices are when compared to other ‘legacy’ devices. (Click on chart for larger image)


Since most people will have their routers turned on for 24-hour a day operation, we think that examining power usage is an important benchmark. Total cost of ownership (TCO) is an important financial estimate that helps consumer’s direct and indirect costs of a product. In our TCO calculation we will be figuring up how much it costs to have a wireless router running per year in an idle state with the unit being installed 24-hours a day. We will be using 12.7 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) based on the bureau of labor statistics report from April 2012 showing that amount as the national average.

Router Power Costs
Benchmark Results: With the Yearly Energy Costs based on Power Consumption we see that the Wireless-AC routers are bunched together costing the consumer slightly more than a router without the latest available wireless technology. (Click on chart for larger image)

Next Page - Linksys EA6500 – Final Thoughts


Review Index
Page 1 - Introducing the Linksys EA6500 802.11ac Wi-Fi Router
Page 2 - Linksys EA6500 – Setup
Page 3 - Linksys EA6500 – Configuration
Page 4 - Linksys EA6500 – Wireless Speed Tests
Page 5 - Linksys EA6500 – Wireless 802.11ac Tests
Page 6 - Linksys EA6500 – Power Consumption
Page 7 - Linksys EA6500 – Final Thoughts