Hi All,
I lost the first draft of this, so if it comes up again...well.

I saw a device a few years back that would monitor the power to a device on a computer and would turn on something when it was brought out of power saving mode. I think it monitored the current draw of the monitor, but Im not sure. It's end function was that when a user came in and took the CPU out of low power mode, the devices attached to the ( power strip?) would come on. Once the monitor went back to black screen, the devices would be cut from power.

I have a digital receiver that I want to use to decode the DTS from my CPU, but I dont want to leave it on all the time.

I have tried several searches and cant seem to find it.

Anybody want to dig around in their memory and see if they can find that device?

Hmmm, well you can power on a device (or a whole power strip) by using the 12v from the PC power source to operate a relay (which would, in turn be wired to switch the power strip on). I know this to work when switching the PC fully on and off, but I don't know if it would work in/out of power save mode.

So the question for someone a bit more computer savvy would be, does the 12v from the PC power supply switch on/off with power save? If so, this would be a relatively inexpensive solution as all it would cost you is a power strip and a relay.

Actually, I found a thread where we discussed it previously.

I finally found it.
I can use the monitor draw to regulate the peripherals.

http://www.cyberguys.com/product-details/?productid=24512

ESP productions Project 79 will do what you want. I'm building one to do pretty much the same thing. In my case it's the speaker amplifier that gets turned on when the computer powers up.

Kids work well too.

"Hey youngest, see that thing with the light on? Go hit that switch. Thanks!"