Watts Up with Electricity?

If you've ever wondered exactly howmuch electricity your appliances use, Kill A Watt may be the perfect gizmo for you.Take that spare fridge in the garage, plug it into Kill A Watt, and get an immediatereadout on how much juice the machine is using. The $40 gadget, available atSmarthome (800-762-7846; www.smarthome.com), measures electricity use inkilowatt-hours, just like your local power company, which makes it easy to figureout the hourly, monthly, or annual cost of keeping an appliance running. Based onKill A Watt's cost projections, you can decide whether to dump an old appliancein favor of a newer, more efficient one. You may also answer thorny questionslike whether to leave your computer on all day or turn it off after each use.