I've had a power strip for years that has one plug that detects power draw on that socket. If there's power flowing, it turns on the rest of the strip. When power stops flowing, it shuts them all off. You plug the computer into that socket and then when you turn it on the rest power up.

Granted the design did have one annoying issue. When my A/C kicks on, the voltage in the house fluctuates and that would trigger the switch on and off briefly. Maybe the USB solution will fix that.

Now if the USB strip lets you activate power sockets as needed, then that would be fantastic. For instance, only power up the scanner when the scanner application is open.

I have one sitting next to my desk, that works in the same way. You have 7 always-on outlets, then 4 that are turned on and off automatically from usb. it is made by radio shack, but I cannot find it on their website...

That's an interesting idea, but the problem that I see with it is that it assumes that all your devices need to be on when the computer is on. What about things like printers? Sure, most of them will stay in a lower-power sleep mode until needed, but why have them on at all?

What I have at home is a combination power bar / swivel stand that sits underneath my monitor and has a switch for each device plus a master switch. When I shut the computer down, I can just flip the master switch and it turns everything on. But when it's on, I can still switch each device on and off easily. We have two of them in the house, one of which is maybe six years old and the other of which I've had for at least twenty years, if not longer. They both work pretty well.

What I really wish is that more devices were designed for this sort of thing. I'd love to have a handy switch to turn all the stuff in my entertainment unit completely off by just cutting the power circuit. However, if I do that, when I turn it back on, the VCR flashes 12:00, the TV wants to go through its setup wizard, the cable box requires up to 10 minutes to set itself up and download the authorizations for the channels, etc.

I've had one of these for a long time. $15 from amazon.com so I don't see the excitement here. I think it's called the mini power minder or some such. Takes one USB port and works like a dream.

They should totally include a USB hub on that thing...plenty of power for it, after all.

Yep, I think SmartHome's Smart Strip does a better job at this by sensing power flow, as it also works in any setup where one control device turned off causes all devices connected to dependent outlets to turn off. Additional always-on outlets are also on the device.

Well, this system has one potentially major advantage over powerstrips that simply sense power flow, which is why I never bought the others but will buy this one.

I use a laptop in a dock. Not only do I want to have the monitor/printer/scanner/etc turn off when turn off OR remove the laptop from the dock, but I also don't need those things on when the laptop is asleep or hibernates! The problem with the power sense powerstrips is that a laptop in a dock is ALWAYS drawing power... in sleep, hibernate, or even when it's off. That's because the power supply brick is always pulling a trickle amount of power to keep the batteries topped off or support the sleep/hibernate loads.

Summary: for those with a laptop in a dock, unless the power-sense powerstrips have a low power cutoff that is above that of the powerbrick trickle, a USB-detected shutoff is a far superior method for controlling these things. USB power is cut from laptops when they're off, hibernating, or in sleep mode. Which is why I will buy two of these, and consider buying them for our whole office.

here is the same for 20 bucks:

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?Sku=C184-34006

I guess it doesn't matter that the PC usually has the power draw capasity to draw 450 watts of power.

Smart idea but the device controlling it needs work.

D~W

I've been using a 220v European version of this for some 5 years!!! Only problem is that it shuts the hard drives down a little fast, (but they don't seem to have suffered.)