[Elecraft] Temperature or Warmth of KPA500 when "Off" ?

[Phil Hystad]

Living in the Pacific Northwest and having just gone through a big bath of heat I have become a temperature detective.  Anything not being used should not be radiating in the infrared spectrum above surroundings.  Thus, all of my radios are off.

Or, so I thought.  I forgot that the KPA500 was still on though off and I put my hand on the side of the cabinet and discovered some dastardly warmth — a “no-no” in this non-air-conditioned house.  So, I unplugged the KPA500 for the time being.

But, I was surprised.  I would have guessed that I would not be able to sense any warmth from the cabinet as the surrounding environment should have kept it cooler.  It was not hot.  Just warm to the touch.  Definitely not as warm as my iMac computer that I am using at the moment.

I should get my infrared temperature sensor and measure the actual radiated temperature and maybe I will do that some day.

But, is this normal?  I assume that there is a small current powering a micro processor and its related circuitry but should it be actually that warm — is there a cpu burning "idle loop" used and thus causing high current flow thru the processor.  

If it were not for the fact that breakfast is almost ready (steel cut oatmeal) I would plug the KPA500 back in and wait a while and then measure the temperature of the cabinet.  I will do that later.

73, phil, K7PEH