Mobile Power Supply?
Trumandrummer
Taylor Michigan Icrontian
Not sure if the is the correct place to post this, but im going on vacation to Florida for school and its a 24 hour bus ride.
Im planning on bringing my lap top, for movies, games etc....
My battery lasts about an hour just browsing the net...
I looked up Universal External batteries and found some that claimed to last 11 hours. But will probably last around 3 while watching movies and stuff.
So I started searching mobile power supplies and found some interesting stuff.
Basically a huge battery able to charge stuff and even jump start cars. The thing is, it doesn't really say how long it will last and im not the greatest with doing the math on currents and power or w/e.
heres a link to one I was looking at http://www.amazon.com/Xantrex-Powerpack-Jumpstarter-Inverter-Backup/dp/B000E6LEIC
I was just wondering if anyone could help me out with this, or maybe someone has past experiences with products like this to tell me how good they work.??
Im planning on bringing my lap top, for movies, games etc....
My battery lasts about an hour just browsing the net...
I looked up Universal External batteries and found some that claimed to last 11 hours. But will probably last around 3 while watching movies and stuff.
So I started searching mobile power supplies and found some interesting stuff.
Basically a huge battery able to charge stuff and even jump start cars. The thing is, it doesn't really say how long it will last and im not the greatest with doing the math on currents and power or w/e.
heres a link to one I was looking at http://www.amazon.com/Xantrex-Powerpack-Jumpstarter-Inverter-Backup/dp/B000E6LEIC
I was just wondering if anyone could help me out with this, or maybe someone has past experiences with products like this to tell me how good they work.??
0
Comments
how long did it last?
The rv/boat battery sounds very good...
And it just so happens that I have a power Inverter, and a boat battery
Any estimate on how long it will last, if I use it to run my laptop without the battery in it. That way its just running the laptop and not trying to charge too.
Because I could go buy another battery, then I would have 2
Example:
boat battery: 80Ah
laptop battery: 4000mAh = 4 Ah
boat / laptop equals 20. So you get 20 times the battery life.
Okay, let's not forget the inverter. It will give you an efficiency of 90%, that leaves 18 hours.
It's important, that you have a sine inverter, not a trapezoid inverter, if you plan to use your regular laptop power supply. Trapezoid may break it. Even better to convert directly from battery to laptop voltage with a car adapter, assumed your boat battery has 12v.
Im not sure what a sine or trapezoid means
It says it converts 12V DC to 110V AC
runs from vehicle or directly from battery
400 Watt, 800 watt peak
and the brand is Vector
The battery is in a case, inside the boat, and I had my dad charge it so that I could do some testing with it. But he said it will charge overnight, So I will look at the stats of the battery tomorrow.
Basically it depends on the quality of the inverter. The cheapest ones have a square output, better ones a trapezoid, also called modified sine, the best ones have a sine output, which is the type of ac you have from your wall plug.
You'll need at least a trapezoid signal for a laptop power supply. At first I thought it needs a sine, but a trapezoid i.e. modified sine should suffice. I was looking into putting an inverter into my VW T4.
Anyways, as for efficiency it would be best to to use a car adapter directly with the battery without the inverter, that's what I am doing in my car now. Also, be aware that shorting that kind of battery is pretty dangerous.
And i figured it was dangerous,I was planning on being carefull
Is there anything dangerous that could go wrong, besides like human error?
Anything else dangerous? Hmm, maybe you could hurt yourself because the battery is so heavy .
http://www.apexbattery.com/universal-universal-laptop-car-adapter-dc-dc-90w-.html
And I could cut off the lighter plug and seder on some alligator clips. Is that what your saying?
I found a 115ah boat battery for 70 bucks at auto zone with trade-in of an old battery. And I don't think my current boat battery is good because its really old. So I might do that because its a lot cheaper that what I have seen online.
In that case you wouldn't need the heavy battery onboard.
1. The teacher sits up front
2. Its a charter bus, so the back seat has two seats facing each other for all my friends.
3. There is a table in the middle of the two seats where we will set up speakers and, play games etc..
Although it isn't a bad idea
I guess if I run out of power or something goes wrong i could switch seats with someone.
-drasnor
My band teacher is actually a really cool guy, he wouldn't care either way
So if I sit in the back and keep it out of site from the driver ill be good. I already got a way of sneaking it in. and im gonna be careful with it, I know its a hazard.... there is always a hazard when it comes to electricity:D
And I might do something like that, but I still want to do the battery thing because, what if the bus driver doesn't want me to do that?
Idk, some bus drivers are really picky, and rude
So I still need a battery as backup...
What you should be doing right now is figuring out your laptop's power consumption. Go download mobmeter and keep track of your average power usage as you try to perform the tasks you want to do on battery. Mess with your power settings, turn down your backlight, step your processor and graphics down to minimum performance, and turn off the wireless radios to save power. Mobmeter will tell you the wattage you're using in real-time so you can compare that versus your battery's current (NOT rated) watt-hour capacity. I say current because lithium-ion batteries lose 10-15% of their capacity per year. It's straightforward division from there to figure out how many hours of runtime you're going to get.
Also consider bringing some other things to do. My Nintendo DS can do about 18 hrs of playtime on a single charge. Bring some cards or a board game. Share bull**** stories with your friends. Sing. Because as awesome as your teachers are, there is no way you're going to get a 60 lb bulky fire and chemical hazard onto a bus.
-drasnor
Occasionally we would stop and get food, and then I would be able to charge my lap top.
But I have done all the changing of stuff like screen brightness and stuff, and it still lasts about an hour and a half to two hours when browsing the net
Now if I was watching a movie, the time might decrease a lot...... and then Id be going about 6 hours at least with no power, or a place to charge...
But I will deff try out that mobmeter,
turn everything down, and run a movie and see how long it lasts....
Im probably gonna ask my teacher what company bus is taking us, and I think im gonna call them and ask if they will have any way to supply power (lighter outlets etc..) But last time, they didn't have anything.
EDIT: another thing I was thinking of, with the idea of using a long extension for a cigarette Lighter
I don't think, that charter buses will even have cigarette Lighters even up front, because isn't it like a law that you can't smoke on these buses?
Lol, problem is..... this trip is for marching band, and we got rid of the pom...
No good looking girls
so they're desperate...
Its flat out against the law to drive that long. Truck drivers can drive like 10 hours in a day, but some keep 2 books so they drive longer anyway.