I've run my 1st gen dishy on the road, and discovered that the inverter needs to be a true sine-wave to get reasonable efficiency from the power brick. With mine, the device just bootlooped on a modified sine wave inverter, presumably because the brick couldn't quite push enough power to complete boot. Jonathan Bennett On Thu, Feb 16, 2023, 5:14 PM Nathan Owens via Starlink < starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote: > I should add, I can actually run the HP dish w/o the router using the same > setup, but when it's obstructed it spikes to ~190W AC, which if it lasts > more than 60s does trip my car E-Fuse. I'll be adding a small battery as a > buffer, which should be able to pull 150W DC from my car, and handle the HP > dish continuous draw of 65-95W. > > On Thu, Feb 16, 2023 at 3:12 PM Nathan Owens wrote: > >> I ran a Round Dishy in my car for a long time, along with the router, >> using a 300W inverter. My car is rated for 12A continuous, 16A peak. Per my >> Kill-A-Watt, it drew on the order of 30-50W, sometimes spiking to 80-90W >> when obstructed/booting. My inverter is 90% efficient, and never tripped my >> car 12v E-fuse. The V3 dish is more efficient, and uses less power. >> >> On Thu, Feb 16, 2023 at 3:08 PM Ulrich Speidel via Starlink < >> starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote: >> >>> In the aftermath of our cyclone here, I got dragged out for a bit of >>> media comment and, downstream, a few questions came up on dishy power use. >>> Here's what I know and can glean - comments welcome: >>> >>> - Starlink's own specs say 50-75 W "Average Power Usage": >>> https://www.starlink.com/specifications. But that's average, not >>> peak, and peak is what matters when people start recommending that Starlink >>> could be run out of a small inverter and a car battery in a disaster. >>> - Small inverters usually come with cigarette lighter cables, and >>> cigarette lighter sockets are typically fused with 8 or 10 A fuses. That >>> puts maximum safe power outputs in the 96W to 130-something W range >>> depending on battery voltage. >>> - Our lab's "RV" subscription rectangular dishy & router regularly >>> clocks in at around 80-100 W, and I've seen it go as high as 108 W on one >>> occasion. I've also seen it go as low as 30 W for the first time last night. >>> - I have a user report from an older round dishy owner having seen >>> up to 200 W on occasion. >>> - Assuming conservatively 90% inverter efficiency, that could mean >>> up to ~120W and maybe more for the rectangular version and over 220 W for >>> the circular one. >>> - If dishy goes over cigarette lighter fuse capacity, people may >>> lose their ability to charge phones from their car - also a critical >>> capability in a disaster. >>> - Not everyone takes kindly to the suggestion that advising >>> inverter + car battery use could potentially be counterproductive. >>> - So, what's the peak power use you have seen on your version of >>> dishy? >>> - It appears that the current mode of operation here is that dishy >>> uses several satellites in parallel if these can all see a gateway and have >>> capacity to carry traffic. >>> - So for us in urban Auckland with few Starlink users in the cell >>> and three gateways in the vicinity, our dishy is spoiled for choice and >>> usually gets to use maybe three or more satellites at once. That takes a >>> corresponding amount of power but also means great data rates a lot of the >>> time. >>> - For a rural user with more Starlink users in the cell and >>> further away from gateways, the satellites that the cell can see and that >>> can also see a gateway may be fewer in number. This means dishy only gets >>> to talk to maybe one or two birds at a time and so uses a lot less power, >>> and you get more average data rates there. >>> - If this is so, then it begs a question: >>> - If Starlink could cap the number of satellites dishy can use in >>> an emergency area, they would be able to keep your fuse intact. Should they >>> aim for that, even if it means that you might see lower data rates in a >>> situation when many people depend on one unit? >>> >>> Starlink is currently being touted as THE comms solution for emergencies >>> as large swathes of NZ's northern and eastern North Island remain without >>> terrestrial or mobile Internet coverage after cyclone Gabrielle. This is >>> the outage map of one of the larger mobile phone providers just for these >>> areas: >>> >>> Most of these are due to power outages to sites, but there are quite a >>> few backhaul cable issues as well. >>> >>> One of the biggest problems is that electronic payment systems don't >>> work without Internet. In our largely cashless society, this is leading to >>> situations where emergency services can't refuel their vehicles because >>> their fuel cards won't work, supermarkets and other stores can't sell >>> anything because customers have no means of paying, and the air force is >>> flying in hard cash in order to help the locals buy food. >>> >>> -- >>> **************************************************************** >>> Dr. Ulrich Speidel >>> >>> School of Computer Science >>> >>> Room 303S.594 (City Campus) >>> >>> The University of Aucklandu.speidel@auckland.ac.nz http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~ulrich/ >>> **************************************************************** >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> Starlink mailing list >>> Starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net >>> https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/starlink >>> >> _______________________________________________ > Starlink mailing list > Starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net > https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/starlink >