40
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by idunnololz@lemmy.world to c/nostupidquestions@lemmy.world

I have some automated pet stuff in my house. There were 2 power outages 2 days in a row. After each one, the pet electronics refused to turn back on even if I unpluged and replugged the power brick from the wall outlet side. They would only turn on if I unplugged the power brick on the electronics side and plugged it back in.

This is kind of a pain because of the cat stuff we own is a litter robot and where it's placed is really tight. It's a huge hassle to access the back side of it to unplug the power brick.

So my question is, why does this happen and are there any workarounds so I don't need to unplug the power brick when it happens?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] Ghoti@lemmy.fmhy.ml 11 points 1 year ago

It’s hard to tell without a circuitry layout, but my best guess is that there’s probably capacitors in the power brick acting as an electrical filtration for the motors to make them operate smoothly and reliably.

The capacitors are probably discharging some electricity that are keeping some circuit protective device alive. Unplugging the power brick is probably the only true way to completely remove electricity from the unit.

[-] idunnololz@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

Oh that does make sense. So if I unplug the unit from the wall outlet side and just wait it should also work? In theory I just need to wait long enough for the power brick to discharge completely. I'll try that next time. Thank you!

[-] Ghoti@lemmy.fmhy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

It’s just a theory based off of my own experience, but if that’s the issue, it kinda depends on how large the capacitors are and what kind of capacity they’re capable of holding.

If it is the issue, I’d expect it to take like 5 minutes for it to discharge completely, but that’s just a guess. If everything is already out of its usual place, you could probably test it if you’re curious enough.

[-] count0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 year ago

Could also be the exact opposite (experienced this with consumer grade electronics based on microcontrollers often enough):

Because of the large capacitors, voltage from the power brick kinda "ramps up" when it is plugged into the wall. The device/its MCU/most specifically its clock circuit however prefers a hard edge of power being turned on, to reliably trigger its power on reset circuit/oscillator.

You can think of it similar to a pendulum/newton's cradle/metronome - they also prefer one decisive push to get going reliably.

Unplugging the brick for a longer time is still worth a try, but it could also be this.

this post was submitted on 15 Jul 2023
40 points (100.0% liked)

No Stupid Questions

35256 readers
1059 users here now

No such thing. Ask away!

!nostupidquestions is a community dedicated to being helpful and answering each others' questions on various topics.

The rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:

Rules (interactive)


Rule 1- All posts must be legitimate questions. All post titles must include a question.

All posts must be legitimate questions, and all post titles must include a question. Questions that are joke or trolling questions, memes, song lyrics as title, etc. are not allowed here. See Rule 6 for all exceptions.



Rule 2- Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material.

Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material. You will be warned first, banned second.



Rule 3- Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here.

Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here. Breaking this rule will not get you or your post removed, but it will put you at risk, and possibly in danger.



Rule 4- No self promotion or upvote-farming of any kind.

That's it.



Rule 5- No baiting or sealioning or promoting an agenda.

Questions which, instead of being of an innocuous nature, are specifically intended (based on reports and in the opinion of our crack moderation team) to bait users into ideological wars on charged political topics will be removed and the authors warned - or banned - depending on severity.



Rule 6- Regarding META posts and joke questions.

Provided it is about the community itself, you may post non-question posts using the [META] tag on your post title.

On fridays, you are allowed to post meme and troll questions, on the condition that it's in text format only, and conforms with our other rules. These posts MUST include the [NSQ Friday] tag in their title.

If you post a serious question on friday and are looking only for legitimate answers, then please include the [Serious] tag on your post. Irrelevant replies will then be removed by moderators.



Rule 7- You can't intentionally annoy, mock, or harass other members.

If you intentionally annoy, mock, harass, or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.

Likewise, if you are a member, sympathiser or a resemblant of a movement that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of a group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you will be banned on sight.



Rule 8- All comments should try to stay relevant to their parent content.



Rule 9- Reposts from other platforms are not allowed.

Let everyone have their own content.



Rule 10- Majority of bots aren't allowed to participate here.



Credits

Our breathtaking icon was bestowed upon us by @Cevilia!

The greatest banner of all time: by @TheOneWithTheHair!

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS