ChatGPT 5 power consumption could be as much as eight times higher than GPT 4 — research institute estimates medium-sized GPT-5 response can consume up to 40 watt-hours of electricity
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I have an extreme dislike for OpenAI, Altman, and people like him, but the reasoning behind this article is just stuff some guy has pulled from his backside. There's no facts here, it's just "I believe XYX" with nothing to back it up.
We don't need to make up nonsense about the LLM bubble. There's plenty of valid enough criticisms as is.
By circulating a dumb figure like this, all you're doing is granting OpenAI the power to come out and say "actually, it only uses X amount of power. We're so great!", where X is a figure that on its own would seem bad, but compared to this inflated figure sounds great. Don't hand these shitty companies a marketing win.
Yeah, I saw some people speculating GPT-5 is having worse performance in some tasks than older models but still being forced to everyone because it's a consolidation and cost cutting version, but how could it be cutting costs if it consumes 8 times more power?
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There's such a huge gap between what I read about GPT-5 online, versus the overwhelmingly disappointing results I get from it for both coding and general questions.
I'm beginning to think we're in the end stages of Dead Internet, where basically nothing you see online has any connection to reality.
The stock market is barely connected to reality and that is required to be updated every 3 months by every single company. Just imagine what the internet's going to be like.
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There's such a huge gap between what I read about GPT-5 online, versus the overwhelmingly disappointing results I get from it for both coding and general questions.
I'm beginning to think we're in the end stages of Dead Internet, where basically nothing you see online has any connection to reality.
Well yeah, it's a for-profit company. They exist solely to make money, that's their entire goal.
It's almost all marketing and has been for a while. ChatGPT peaked with 4o (and 4.5 if you used their API), 4.1 was a step backwards despite them calling it an improvement, and 5 was another step backwards.
They are not any closer to AGI, and we're not going to see AGI from LLMs no matter how much they claim just how close we are to seeing AGI.
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I was just thinking, in more affordable electric regions of the US that's about $5 worth of electricity, per thousand requests. You'd tip a concierge $5 for most answers you get from Chat GPT (if they could provide them...) and the concierge is likely going to use that $5 to buy a gallon and a half of gasoline, which generates a whole lot more CO2 than the nuclear / hydro / solar mixed electrical generation, in reasonably priced electric regions of the US...
That doesn't seem right. By my calculations it should be like 5¢. Can you show your work?
Edit: didn't read. You said "per thousand requests."
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And how many milliwatts does an actual brain use?
1.21 jigawatts
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1.21 jigawatts
Ahh but you need 8 for a round trip
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they vibe calculated it.
They asked chatgpt 4 about chatgpt 5 power consumption.
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That doesn't seem right. By my calculations it should be like 5¢. Can you show your work?
Edit: didn't read. You said "per thousand requests."
Depends on your electric rates, of course. The gotcha in this statement is "per thousand requests" which cranks up the power usage from 40 watt-hours to 40 kilowatt hours. Say you've got "affordable" electricity at 12.5 cents per kilowatt hour: 40 * .125 = 5.
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What exactly do you get for that power though?
The point is that it's too much power for little gain in return.
Arguably, a great deal more than the energy you lose from opening the door to your house in the summer, once while the A/C is running.
Or, looking at it another way, an AI query+result can be just as valuable as a Tik Tok post / view.
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Arguably, a great deal more than the energy you lose from opening the door to your house in the summer, once while the A/C is running.
Or, looking at it another way, an AI query+result can be just as valuable as a Tik Tok post / view.
I consider TikTok harmful, so you are right about your last sentence.
But my AC does not nor ever has actually consumed 4kW in an hour.
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I consider TikTok harmful, so you are right about your last sentence.
But my AC does not nor ever has actually consumed 4kW in an hour.
The average (US suburban 2200sq ft) home's A/C does consume 4kW while it is cycled on, and in the hotter than normal months of summer it can run continuous duty cycle for hours on end.
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The average (US suburban 2200sq ft) home's A/C does consume 4kW while it is cycled on, and in the hotter than normal months of summer it can run continuous duty cycle for hours on end.
You need better insulation then. That's crazy. Also outdoor blinds.
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You need better insulation then. That's crazy. Also outdoor blinds.
Me, personally, we have trees and shade. So many subdivisions don't, and they have dark colored roofs, and then homeowners do bone-headed things like adding "sun rooms" - lots of those in Houston.
We get upset when our electric bill passes $300 for the month, but our neighbors with the 3500 sq ft? They never see it under $400.