169

Magic fix for smart devices Rule (media.kbin.social)

submitted 6 months ago by static@kbin.social to c/196@lemmy.blahaj.zone

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[-] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 37 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

This is also helpful for those battery powered devices that you don't want powered all the time, as it degrades the battery.

Like, say, an old android phone spun up on your network as a Pi-Hole for ad-blocking.

Just have the power cycle slightly shorter than it usually takes to run out of battery power, and power it up for enough time to charge it.

Also, routers usually have an option to auto-reboot at specified intervals.

Finally, for Windows PCs, you can set up an automated reboot cycle with Task Scheduler.

For Linux PCs, you can set an automated reboot cycle by editing your Crontab.

For macOS, you can use pmset.

[-] Eheran@lemmy.world 26 points 6 months ago

Note that limiting the maximum battery charge to something like 70 % would be more effective in those cases, completely avoiding the high voltages of a full charge.

However, even that seems absurd in such a use case. Does it matter if the old battery in an old phone gets worse? Especially when only used stationary anyway? Especially when the difference is sometime tiny like 5 % vs. 8 % (=3 % saved) capacity loss per year?

[-] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 11 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Say you leave it fully charged and you lose 10% usable capacity a year. 5 years in and you have a large-scale power outage, and you were smart enough to buy a beefy ups (and maintain that battery) to power your NAS and network equipment, but because you didn't with the phone, you lose DNS after like 2.5 hours (phone pihole) because the phone is dead. Now what are you going to do, just not look at porn on plex and weep because you can't browse lemmy in the dark? smh, forward thinking would have saved you. Now you gotta get the magazines to fap and make shitposts in mspaint until the grid comes back up.

Treat your batteries well. Enjoy your porn. Make power outages bearable.

Edit: I have a total of 4 ups units for a reason taps forehead

[-] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 12 points 6 months ago

what are you going to do, just not look at porn

I have a total of 4 ups units for a reason

I think I may have figured out the reason.

[-] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago

[-] Nindelofocho@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago

4 UPSs with maintained batteries but using only an android phone for pihole? I imagine at the 2nd or 3rd UPS you would at least consider a more dedicated device to run pihole and have some redundancy

[-] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 2 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

I dunno, it's not my theoretical situation. I have no idea how you'd even run a ph on a smartphone, I thought the most basic thing it will run on is a raspberry pi. Using wlan for both in and out isn't best practices too afaik. I'm just trying to give an example why you shouldn't just abuse tech 'just because'.

[-] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 1 points 6 months ago

I dunno, it's not my theoretical situation. I have no idea how you'd even run a ph on a smartphone, I thought the most basic thing is will run on is a raspberry pi. Using wlan for both in and out isn't best practices too afaik. I'm just trying to give an example why you shouldn't just abuse tech 'just because'.

[-] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Does it matter if the old battery in an old phone gets worse?

I was under the impression long-term connection to power would lead to higher likelihood of battery swelling? But I don't know shit about batteries so I could easily be wrong.

I would prefer if I could power a device without needing a battery installed, but that design is rare these days.

[-] Eheran@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago

Some phones should work without a battery installed. But with newer phones, removing the battery is not trivial. Maybe that will change in the coming years, let's see the EU push.

In any case, 10 % loss per year is way too high. I am currently at 4.7 % over the last 2 years with a phone from 3 years ago.

[-] 4am@lemm.ee 1 points 6 months ago

If I’m using an old phone for a PiHole, the the battery is there to perform a safe shutdown when the power gets cut, basically a UPS to flush the write logs.

[-] misophist@lemmy.world 10 points 6 months ago

Wait, constant charge/discharge cycling is better for phone batteries than smart phone trickle charge circuitry?

[-] princessnorah@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 points 6 months ago

I don’t think it’s so much the charge circuitry as keeping the battery at 100% all of the time. keeping it plugged, but software limited to 80% capacity is probably better than letting it discharge.

[-] misophist@lemmy.world 6 points 6 months ago

I know keeping a battery at 100% is worse than 80% for li-ion batteries. That is not the discussion. OP specifically suggested a constant full charge/discharge cycle as an improvement over leaving the device plugged in, and I can't imagine that being better for the battery.

[-] princessnorah@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 6 months ago

I guess what I was trying to say is that yeah, it probably would be better than keeping it fully charged. I wouldn’t let it dip below 20% though.

[-] Eheran@lemmy.world 1 points 6 months ago

Lower is no problem. The damage is done by the high voltages and also temperature. Don't go below something like 2 V and you will be just fine.

[-] princessnorah@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 6 months ago

Whilst going below 20% is definitely a lot less bad than going over 80%, it will have the longest life if you stick between those two.

[-] Eheran@lemmy.world 1 points 6 months ago

No. Going as low as possible and staying as low as possible is the best for any lithium battery. Here a good source: Accubattery. Note how "battery University" is not a credible source, despite their name. Maybe they made people believe this in the first place.

And here a primary source for the most fragile LiPo cells. Look at figure 7. Even down to 1.2 V and the cells still reached 50 cycles until they were at 80 % remaining capacity. Not going below 2 V and it will be just fine.

[-] Aasikki@sopuli.xyz 1 points 6 months ago

Should be better better than just cooking it at 100%, but still not ideal in the long run. Ideally you'd bypass the battery entirely.

It's recommended to keep batteries at around 40-60% for storage while not in use. Not sure if keeping it around there would help when it's in use, but that could be worth looking into if bypassing isn't an option.