Please consider the intended control device when purchasing this product. I purchased this to use in my home theater. I wanted to completely turn off my subwoofer amp, blu-ray player, PS3 and wii when my main amp is turned off. I do not want to use my TV as the control device as I want to be able to watch cable on the TV without turning everything else on. So, I used my Pioneer amp as the control device. Unfortunately, the Pioneer must draw too much power in standby as the Belkin will not recognize when I turn it off. The Belkin is not adjustable for this situation. I ended up getting the Smart Strip SCG3 Smart Strip SCG3 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology which does have an adjustment. A quarter turn to the left on the adjustment screw and it is working perfectly. It has one less outlet than the Belkin (Smart Strip does make them with more) but the Smart Strip is less expensive and actually works in my situation. BTW, I have tested the Belkin with other control devices and while most work, a few just do not. Belkin Conserve Smart AV F7C007q Energy-Saving Power Strip
I've been thinking about buying a controlled power strip for quite some time. Now that I have a home theater with a ton of components, with combined vampire power that is somewhat significant (standby modes must die!), it was time to take the plunge.
What do I like most about this Belkin unit? It just works. It arrives in a nondescript cardboard package with a tiny little booklet, alerting you to the fact that you can just plug this in and let it function as intended. I have my plasma TV in the control outlet, and the rest of the devices are as follows: 1) Onkyo AVR, 2) PS3, 3) XBOX, 4) Wii, 5) Subwoofer. Note: if you have a powered subwoofer, I highly recommend using the strip to control it. For whatever reason, almost all subwoofers use an inordinate amount of power when in standby mode. So, in practice: I turn the TV on and the rest of the electronics have power within 2-3 seconds. I turn the TV off and everything shuts down in about 5-6 seconds. I like the delay on shutdown. For instance, it takes a few seconds for the PS3 to completely power down. So if I forget the PS3 is not yet off and kill the TV, the delay is long enough to allow the PS3 to cycle off before cutting power. Whether intended by design or not, nice.
I looked extensively at the "Smart Strip" units also sold on Amazon before the Belkin was available. They seem like fine products, but many users complained that adjusting the sensitivity was difficult and the strip would often fail to properly determine whether the control piece of gear was on or off. As with anything, YMMV. This Belkin has no such adjustment, perhaps indicating the internal sensitivity is just better. It has worked flawlessly every time for me.
The only thing I don't like about this unit is readily apparent before buying, but just be aware: I wish it had more controlled outlets! Not a con because I bought it knowing full well its outlet capacity, but we always want more.
In conclusion, if you have a home theater, buy this strip!
I was really excited when I'd first seen this product prior to its release. I live in an apartment where I only pay the power utility, and I'm a heavy user of electricity with a PS3, 360, Mac Mini, PC tower, 200W stereo system and a 32" LCD television. I was really excited to get these since I don't need some of that turned on all the time but some things (like the Mac and the PC) would be useful to have on all the time.
Enter the Belkin Conserve Smart AV Energy Saving Power Strip. Does it do what it's advertised to do? Absolutely! If you've never used a master-control power strip before it may be a bit confusing to use at first, but here's the basic rundown:
There are three kinds of outlets on this thing: one master, five control and two main ("always-on") outlets. Plug the main device you would use with the other devices (in this case, my stereo, computers and gaming consoles are used when I have my television on, so I put my LCD television into the Master outlet). Then I plugged my peripherals that I only wanted to use when the television was turned on (my PS3, 360, and stereo system) into the Control outlets. Finally, I plugged my Mac and PC into the Always-On outlets at the end.
So what happens? My Mac and PC are allowed to be always-on; thus even when my TV is turned off, both my Mac and PC will backup and do whatever I told them to do (you can always just shut them down if you aren't using them, but my Mac uses next to no power and my PC normally gets shut down after use). My gaming consoles and stereo are only turned on when I turn on my television; thus my PS3 and 360 only use power when my TV is turned on (which is awesome since I have the older models that suck power!). The only one that is a bit of an outlier is my stereo, since I could technically use that even without my TV turned on by hooking up my iPod and plugging it into a normal outlet, but it's not that big of a deal.
All in all, as much as I would love one more Always-On outlet, this is a great little product. It's the same size as a normal power strip in terms of length but it's considerably thicker (it's about 2-3 inches tall). The only other slight downside is if you have some weird-shaped power plugs they might not all fit well on this because, like a normal power strip, it's pretty tight in space. However, I still noticed a difference (a couple of bucks lower) in my power bill after setting this up with my main electronics setup, so I would highly recommend this to anyone looking for a good power-saving option. - Surge Protector - Belkin - Energy Savings - Eco-friendly'
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