Home > Consumer Reviews > Smart Strip LCG3 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology

I bought one of these and it's a good quality product. I'd give it 5 stars if it was a little more cost effective. I also bought a Watt meter with this so I could find the best place to put this device to use. I found that most devices only use a watt or less on standby. You computer speakers if you leave them plugged in and on use 8-10 watts (with computer off of coarse), my small HP printer uses about 4 watts in standby. So with a computer you might save 14 watts. If you pay 20 cents a kWH (which is high) you'll save 18-20, assuming you use your computer on average 4 hours a day: 14 * (24-4) * 356 / 1000 * 0.20 = $19.94 in a year. So this won't pay for itself in a year, but it is like getting a surge protector for $10.

The best place I found to use this was the cable TV box in my bedroom. It's not a DVR so I have it switch off now with the TV. In standby mode, the box alone uses about 30 watts, and the receiver uses 1 watt. It's also nice to just switch off the TV and have everything switch off at once. This should save me about $44 a year.

One last note, I found my sub-woofer eating up 10 watts 24/7 because I had it plugged directly in to the wall instead of the outlet in the back of the receiver. If you use one, you may want to check where you plug in yours.

Put my G5 iMac to sleep and it shuts off selected peripherals (speakers, printer, other wall warts)! Awsome!

Sorry to report we threw this unit out three months after installation. It was connected to our computer and worked fine until one day it would not turn on despite all efforts. We removed, reset, plugged elswhere it just died. It wasn't worth the time and expense to repackage, bring to P.O. and be without a circuit breaker for an expensive computor.

I really wanted to save money with all my peripherals hooked to my year old Imac.
The USB devices made the computer cycle back on after 2 seconds. Unplugging various devices would only work intermittently. There was no rhyme or reason to get the strip to work as advertised. I sent it back. I also purchased a Kill A Watt energy monitor. (That works great) In sleep mode the Imac and peripherals draw about 25 watts. (110 when running)
Now I wish I could get my cable box to shut down-it draws about 40 watts all the time.

I ordered a couple of these power strips, along with the Kill-A-Watt device, and have been very happy with the function and value!

I used one on my entertainment center. The Kill-A-Watt helped me identify my DVD carousel player was vamping about 4-5W in "off" mode. Plus some other devices.. 1W here, 1W there. My sub was already plugged into my switched outlet on the receiver so that wasn't an issue. Although I previously had it in the wall.. But you may have a similar situation.

So now I've got my receiver plugged into the control port, everything else is in the switched. Works great.

With the other unit I had planned to plug my laptop into it.. and while my laptop draws anywhere from 24-40 watts, it didn't seem to be enough to actually "switch" the unit. So I'm back to my regular power strip there. Now I just turn it off when the laptop is off. It seems this might be the same problem reported by the previous "iMac" user. Seems if the device doesn't draw enough power it won't switch the switch. And yes I tried the adjustment knob maxed both ways.

All in all very satisfied with the unit. Works for my entertainment center and that's what I was most concerned with. And the payback will be < 1 year.