I put a USB power meter in line with my Play running v1.5. I was interested in seeing what the normal draw is and what the range seems to be. It’s good to know if you want to power the Play from your tablet or Computer.
As expected, Grid Brightness and Keyboard display significantly effect overall power consumption.
With dense pattern pages (lots of lit steps) and Grid Brightness set to High, USB current averages around 650mA in my tests.
Example:
Dense pattern page w/kybd on:
High-647mA, Med-560mA, Low-460mA
Worst case (all steps lit & kybd on):
High-925mA, Med-720mA, Low-520mA
Lowest Draw:
Empty Project, Brightness: Low-410mA
So, the change from High Brightness to Low Brightness results in around 30 to 40% power reduction on the OG Play. If you want to reduce the load on your power source this is the way to do it.
I assume the figures are similar for the Play+.
It’s more powerful CPU likely draws more current especially with the addition of the synth engines, but the LED’s in the grid are still likely a considerable portion of the overall load.