Bits Limited SCG-3MVR Smart Strip Advanced Power Strip, 7-Outlets, Surge Protector, 15A, 4ft. Cable, Pack of 1

This is actually a review of 3 different products. I'm putting the reviews all together because I'm using them all for one application and I thought others may find it interesting. I have a small closet that stores all my audio equipment. The receiver and DVR put out a lot of heat so I have been looking for a way to cool them. I wanted to be able to have a fan turn on when I turned on the receiver and turn off when I turned it off. Unfortunately the receiver does not have a switched outlet so I had to find a different solution. There isn't much clearance so I decided to use a computer fan. After purchasing some other fans that did not move enough air I found this. 3 of Cooling Fan-AFB1212GHE-CF00 120x 38mm - TAC Sensor, 3-pin, 240.96CFM, 5200RPM, 62dBA, 2.45A (Max 3.24A), 27.48 air pre. The thing I learned about all of these little fans is that you have to pay attention to the #'s. CFM is "cubic feet per minute" basically how much air it moves. Be aware this fan is strong it moves more air than a hair dryer. RPM is speed and dBA is how loud it is. I purchased other fans before I learned about the #'s and some of them didn't move enough air to blow a piece of paper. These fans are loud. I actually purchased 3 fans and with all 3 fans going it was too much wind and too loud so I bought this. Lamptron FC2 Fan Speed Controller 45W x 6 channel Black This allows me to control the speed of the fans which affect how much air they move and how loud they are. This was one of the only speed controllers I could use because most of them could not handle a fan that required as much amperage as these do. The next problem I had to solve was how to get the fans to turn on when the receiver comes on. I tried a thermostat that is designed to turn on a certain temperatures but it had a limited range so it didn't work. I also tried a thermal probe from another company but its power supply failed as soon as I connected it to the fans. Then I found this Smart Strip SCG3 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology You connect the receiver to what is called the master plug and the other outlets don't receive any power until they sense the master plus is drawing power. I didn't want to wait for delivery to so I bought two different brands from home depot and lowes but the receiver draws too much power even when its off so they didn't work right. The Smart Strip has a dial on the side that you can adjust the sensitivity (this is a big benefit I'm not sure why they don't hype it in the description, I wouldn't have known if it wasn't for a review I read). It took a couple of minutes to get it just right but now it all works perfect. When I turn on the receiver the power stip senses the power is on and provides power to the fan controller which is perfectly set to turn the fans at the speed I want so they aren't too loud but keep my electronics nice and cool. I even found a local metal shop to build a nice bracket for me for $25 to hold the fans. This took several trials and errors but now it works perfectly. Hopefully this will help someone else in the future. I would definitely recommend all of these products.

First, if you can't tell from the description, here's how this works: one outlet (blue in the picture) is the "master" outlet. If something plugged into this outlet is turned on, it will activate the automatically switched outlets (green in this picture). If not, they will be switched off. The idea is to help you save energy by effectively turning off power to things that might draw a phantom load just by being plugged in, even when you don't need them (and sometimes even when they're turned off) like computer monitors, speakers, DVD players, or pretty much anything with an AC adapter. Finally, there are two always-on (red in the picture) outlets that are never automatically switched off (but, of course, you still turn off them and the entire power strip with the physical switch). I have two of these, one for my computer and one for my other computer that I use in place of a TV. Both have the computer in the "master" outlet and the monitor and speakers in the automatically switched outlets. I have a floor lamp in the always-on outlet in one so I can use it without my computer, and I have my wireless router in an always-on outlet of the other. Both have worked wonderfully, exactly as expected, by switching off the desired peripherals when the computer is off or sleeping. I've both for over a year now, in constant use, and they're holding up fine. A key feature of this power strip that I couldn't find on similar products (like the Belkin Conserve strip) is that you can adjust the sensitivity of the master outlet with a screw on the side of this power strip. This is important because, for example, my MacBook often uses so little power when it's *on* that the power strip didn't initially detect it and turn on the switched outlets. I had to adjust the screw a bit to make it switch on and off as expected. You can also do the same if your device uses more power than expected when off (or sleeping or whatever) in order to make the power strip still turn off the extra devices. Reviews I've read for other strips without this feature seem to indicate that some people have problems that could be resolved if they were able to do this. Finally, I've noticed this same company makes similar power strips in different sizes with different features (7 or 10 outlets; just power or power plus phone or phone and coaxial cable protection). Until I rearranged my equipment, I almost wish I would have purchased a larger one, but this one works fine for me now and it's also the least expensive. In summary, this product has worked as expected for me and held up to my usage for over a year so far. If you're looking for a product like this, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this one, especially on account of its adjustable sensitivity, a feature that appears to be lacking in most other "green" power strips.

I bought this because my new A/V receiver doesn't have a switched outlet in the back like the old one. I was using this feature to control my home-grown home theater cooling system so that it would turn on whenever the receiver was on. I faced the choice of running the fans all the time, going to a thermal switch solution or some other IR or trigger switch, and that gets expensive quick based on my research. The manual on/off method would have worked, but I wanted to make sure cooling was on whenever the receiver was on because of the heat generated in a closed cabinet. This particular strip and brand was suggested on an AV forum as a way to fix that for home theater cooling in general, so I have the receiver plugged in the master outlet and the strip switches the cooling system on/off based on the power drain sensed by the strip. This is a very elegant solution, and a lot cheaper than the alternatives assuming that the manual option is off the table (that is definitely the cheapest!). The strip provides four outlets that turn on whenever whatever is plugged in the master outlet on the strip starts draining amps(eg, turned on). The strip also has two un-switched outlets. There's a manual power switch as well and some circuitry that offers some surge suppression - a feature I was not interested in but comes in the product. The strip is suprisingly heavy and feels very sturdy compared to other box store surge suppressor power strips I've owned in the past. I really like that that this product has a knob on its side to tune the sensitivity of the sensor the monitors the power drain of the master outlet. The default setting worked well for my receiver and the product works well, and the power turns on instantly when the receiver is switched on, and turns off when the receiver goes in standby, exactly the desired behavior. This was a relatively cheap solution to my problem, and instead of purchasing a thermostat switch to control my cooling system or going to a trigger switch or more complex setups, this did exactly the trick and a price point that met my budget. I highly recommend for this type of specialized application.

This is a review of the Smart Strip SCG3 / 049418906 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology product offered by Amazon.com. This product when plugged in with no load, uses virtually no power. In my home it is controlled by my TV set. The devices which power on and off (the controlled devices) include an Xbox 360 (Elite), PS3 (60 GB), a Wii and an 8 port Ethernet switch. Using a Kill A Watt, my power savings vs not having this switch are about $2-$3 per month, depending on how long the set is on for. The longer the set is on (that my kids play) the less is saved. My electric rate per KWH is about 18 cents. This device will pay for itself in 10-15 months using my configuration. To know how long it will take to pay for itself in your home, you'll need a Kill A Watt or similar product, and will need to measure the power off energy consumption of the devices which will be turned off by this product. In my opinion any product which pays for itself in under 2 years is a reasonable purchase. If I had fewer devices controlled, or if they were different devices, the only way to tell if this would save enough energy to justify the cost is by using a Kill A Watt or similar device. My suggestion is to take the $30 you'd spend on this, and purchase a Kill A Watt first, then you'll know the energy consumption of the appliances which this device will fully power down. You need to measure them in the off state to determine if this energy strip is viable for your situation. I personally prefer the Kill A Watt 4460 as you can enter your energy cost, and it will tell your what an appliance costs to use per day, week, month or year. Purchasing this strip without a measurement of energy use from the controlled devices, is making a guess, maybe an educated guess, about power savings. Our devices are controlled by a 47" LCD TV, and no adjusting of sensitivity was required. My guess is any large appliance can control all smaller appliances on a circuit. This appears to be a reasonable product to use when controlling devices linked to a TV or home Computer. It may have difficulty with some energy efficient laptops.

I got one of these color coded smart surge protectors for my mother's TV setup and it worked so well I got one for mine. I plugged the TV into the controller plug (blue), and the speakers, roku box, and BluRay player into 3 of the 4 green switched plugs. Now they all go completely off with the TV (except the TV which is on standby) and all come on when the TV is turned on. Not only does this save electricity, it turns off the annoyingly bright LEDs on the speakers and streaming box. The red and green LEDs on the power strip itself are fairly bright but are hidden behind a clock. A table lamp is plugged into 1 of the 2 red unswitched outlets. The end green switched plug is separated from the others in case you have a large powerplug that needs space. There's a screw to adjust the sensitivity of the current draw for the controller plug, but I didn't touch it as the TV draws enough current to trigger the switch turning on the green outlets. If you are using something smaller than a TV, you might need to play with this to get it to turn on the green outlets. 5 Stars

A little over a year ago I purchased one of these for my arcade cabinet. The switch on / switch off mechanism in that case is actuated by a computer tower and it controls the monitor, speakers, internal lights. After adjusting the first time it worked well for a few months then it left itself on one time so I re-adjusted and haven't had any lagging yet. It works just like I expected. It worked so well in fact that I bought another for the living room. It is switched based on the television and it controls the PS3, Wii, and DVD player with a laptop on the constant on socket. It works perfectly. One little thing that I didn't think about at first however involved the laptop. Even though I put it in sleep mode whenever I am done using it (display is on the television) the socket would power down, the battery would drain, and then when I turned on the television it would struggle to charge itself. Since I don't want to destroy the battery through all of these cycles I just leave it in the constant on socket. Again, it's stupid that I didn't think about it before. Nevertheless, it works great, figured I would leave a review since I am buying a third one this weekend due to the speakers on my wife's computer having a bright blue status light that keeps the living room bright early in the morning.

UPDATE: 2 1/2 years of use and it started buzzing LOUD!!! No clue what it was but I had to unplug my computer to get it to stop! I don't know what it means but have to worry what would have happened had I not been home? Would my computer have been damaged? Fire? I saw another review post the same problem on a different model after 2 years and someone from customer service responded that they would replace it. That sounds like good customer service however I don't think I will trust them again. Clearly from the other reviews this is not a common problem Maybe no more common than with other powerstrips however this is the first time I have experienced such a problem and I don't want to use them anymore. :-( Hope this was indeed a rare occurrence. Original Review: I just got it and set it up so probably too early to review but I have already encountered a frustrating issue. The Always on outlets do not have space for an adapter. I guess I should have noticed this when I selected this one but I did not and my modem/router which needs to be always on has a huge adapter that not only blocks the 2nd always on outlet but also one of the switched outlets! This leaves me with only 3 switched outlets and one always on outlet 8-(. I am going to get one of those little extender things but think this is not an uncommon scenario and wish they had planned it a bit better. The bigger one has space for it in the always on outlet but it would have been overkill or my needs. Aside from that it was easy to set up, I turned it all the way down and turned on my computer then turned the dial until the other stuff came on and turned my computer off and the other stuff went off like it should. It has a flat plug for the wall and slots on the back i guess for mounting to the wall which i have not tried yet. Overall I can't rate it low for something I should have noticed but it is annoying and thought I would mention this aspect of it... plan accordingly!

I try to be "green" as much as possible and after recently buying a new surround sound & music system, I was reminded of just how many devices and adapters are plugged in at any one time to make it all work. I had read about "smart" power strips and saw a link to one online. After reading the description and finding one on Amazon that seemed worth a try for the cost, I went ahead and ordered it. I admit that once I got it, I read the instructions and was a little surprised that there is a sensitivity setting on it that might need to be adjusted if the other components don't turn off or on as expected. However, after connecting it and using my AV receiver as the main component, it worked perfectly right out of the box. I use an Auto Power Down setting on my receiver so that I can listen to music when I go to sleep. Sure enough, the receiver turns off at the pre-set time and a second or two later you can hear a click and the other components and DC adapters plugged into the strip turn off as well. No more "phantom power" use by these devices when they are not actually being used. There are also some constant live outlets on the strip for devices that you would not normally want to turn off so they'll keep their clock settings or be available to record shows, etc. when you're not home. A good product and a decent price!

I used four LED strips as bias lights behind my television, the tv USB Jack didn’t push enough current to light all four LED strips, this switching power bar was able to turn on the circuit with the strips on it when the television powered up. Great device

Si requieres enceder algun equipo al momento de prender tu equipo de audio como puede ser un subwoofer, amplificador, etc... esta es una opción muy economica.

great product, i have it turning on my tv & power amp, off of my computer, it will power the stuff down even when going into sleep mode.

I couldn't adjust the threshold high enough to pass the PC phantom power when shutdown.

Very useful