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Putting An End to Dust Inside Computers

K

krw

Jan 1, 1970
0
Question: In case you often do that sans power cord, how does the
battery fare over time?

I generally have it plugged in. My old work ThinkPad A21 had a
battery life when new of just over two hours (the screen was a hog).
After four years, one battery was down to about 1/2 hour and the
other was about 1:15.
When I bought a new laptop recently I was
surprised that they recommend a lengthy "battery calibration routine"
every three months. Takes hours.

Haven't seen anything like that on this ThinkPad. They do recommend
a cycle or two when it's new.
I am pretty new to the LiIon game. One
of my other laptops has one but it's always plugged in.

This one is plugged in pretty much all the time too. I bought it
last April and the battery cycle count is only 34. Batteries are
expensive.
 
J

Joerg

Jan 1, 1970
0
krw said:
I generally have it plugged in. My old work ThinkPad A21 had a
battery life when new of just over two hours (the screen was a hog).
After four years, one battery was down to about 1/2 hour and the
other was about 1:15.




Haven't seen anything like that on this ThinkPad. They do recommend
a cycle or two when it's new.




This one is plugged in pretty much all the time too. I bought it
last April and the battery cycle count is only 34. Batteries are
expensive.

Yeah, and their design engineers seem to have lost the art of power
efficiency. My old Compaq Contura was the last one that I'd consider
efficient. 5-6 hours on a NiCd. The laptop case cracked all around from
too much flying and the battery is dead by now. But if I had my druthers
I'd resurrect it with 10 NiMH AA cells, giving it more capacity than the
old battery ever had. Just imagine, a whole day on one charge, with <$20
worth of AA rechargeables. Seems that "modern" designers can't touch
that anymore :-(
 
J

Joerg

Jan 1, 1970
0
krw said:
I always let mine burn out before cleaning the ashes (it does have a
drawer). Have you thought about a central vac? I'm going to look
hard at one for our next house.

That would almost require tearing down and rebuilding the house. Tons of
firestops, it was quite over-engineered (which I consider a good thing).

I've used about 2/3s of a cord in five years (it's nice and dry ;).
I was going to try to use the rest this winter but it hasn't been
cold enough (and I was sick during the worst of it).

Same here. Engineer and machinist at a client got sick. Very sick. So I
flew home and returned one more time to finish the project. Came home
again, crashed into the pillows and didn't get out of bed for almost a
week. At times the ceiling seemed to spin. It was bad. Of course this
was during the long freeze and my wife had to do the wood stove hauling
and loading all by herself. Then I got better but in the meantime must
had passed the virus on to my wife :-(
Since I've used two cords in 13 years...

Do you use a lot of other energy to heat? If not your house must be in a
thick box of styrofoam or maybe you live on a tropical island ;-)
 
R

Robert Latest

Jan 1, 1970
0
Joerg said:
I'd resurrect it with 10 NiMH AA cells, giving it more capacity than the
old battery ever had. Just imagine, a whole day on one charge, with <$20
worth of AA rechargeables. Seems that "modern" designers can't touch
that anymore :-(

It's pretty amazing, isn't it, that there doesn't seem to be any appreciable
market for mobile computers that people would use to get some *actual* work
done. After all, 99% of the time that 3GHz CPU thing just idles while
waiting for user input, unless you play games, watch movies or rip DVDs.

I'd love to see a laptop that you could "down-clock" to a few hundred MHz to
milk a few dozen hours extra out of the batteries. Of course this would
virtually freeze up any modern office suite, and the art of using a simple
ASCII editor for writing texts seems to be a forgotten one.

I've recently used EAGLE on a 133 MHz Pentium. There's no real difference to
the 3GHz CPU unless you ratsnest polygons (or use the autorouter, but who
does that anyway).

robert
 
J

Joerg

Jan 1, 1970
0
Robert said:
Joerg wrote:




It's pretty amazing, isn't it, that there doesn't seem to be any appreciable
market for mobile computers that people would use to get some *actual* work
done. After all, 99% of the time that 3GHz CPU thing just idles while
waiting for user input, unless you play games, watch movies or rip DVDs.

I'd love to see a laptop that you could "down-clock" to a few hundred MHz to
milk a few dozen hours extra out of the batteries. Of course this would
virtually freeze up any modern office suite, and the art of using a simple
ASCII editor for writing texts seems to be a forgotten one.

AFAIR this Contura actually throttled back to a few MHz. And no, the
Office package did not crash. I did my book keeping on it while
traveling so I'd have noticed ;-)

Then one day the bottom literally fell out. When lifting the laptop to
put it away because of serious turbulence during a flight the battery
and the HD cover plate were still in my lap. I discovered a crack around
the whole perimeter of the case. It was duct tape time :-(

I've recently used EAGLE on a 133 MHz Pentium. There's no real difference to
the 3GHz CPU unless you ratsnest polygons (or use the autorouter, but who
does that anyway).

Eagle runs just fine one one of these clunkers here. "Only" 64MB of RAM.
 
W

w_tom

Jan 1, 1970
0
A computer case designer would probably figure that it's better to
error with too much airflow.
If so.. When I try using filters, the reduced airflow might be ok.
D from BC

A computer designer always does the design in theory - the numbers -
and again in prototype - the experiemental evidence. Both are
necessary to learn. From learning, a computer case designer then
oversized the cooling. One 80 mm chassis fan is more than
sufficient. Do the numbers yourself. Its simple multiplication. One
80 mm chassis fan is more than sufficient cooling. Every informed
computer assembler would know these numbers. Too many, instead, are
mocked by Tim Allen's joke - "More power".

Dust problems in normal environments are symptoms of too much
airflow. We add a second fan. How much does the second fan reduce
chassis temperatures? Notice how trivial that temperature is. And
yet others somehow know only by feeling - and they install "More
fans". Then they recommend quarterly vacuum sessions in the shop.
Then replacable filters. Then electrostatic dust collectors in the
room. Then .... all because they could not do simple arithmetic or
even measure how much nothing that second fan added. But they know
because "More Power" is always a solution.
 
K

krw

Jan 1, 1970
0
krw wrote:


That would almost require tearing down and rebuilding the house. Tons of
firestops, it was quite over-engineered (which I consider a good thing).

Firestops? I don't want any of them blocking my exit! ;-)

Same here. Engineer and machinist at a client got sick. Very sick. So I
flew home and returned one more time to finish the project. Came home
again, crashed into the pillows and didn't get out of bed for almost a
week. At times the ceiling seemed to spin. It was bad. Of course this
was during the long freeze and my wife had to do the wood stove hauling
and loading all by herself. Then I got better but in the meantime must
had passed the virus on to my wife :-(

That sounds like the time I had Mono. I came home from college
registration on a Wednesday and didn't get out of bed until the
following Tuesday.

I was in the hospital (AFib) for three days around St. Valentines day
(my wife's boss cleared the 36" of snow from our driveway). They're
trying to get the anticoagulation meds right then, from what I can
gather, they're going to play with electricity. The doctors here
don't seem to like to divulge any plans, so who knows?
Do you use a lot of other energy to heat? If not your house must be in a
thick box of styrofoam or maybe you live on a tropical island ;-)

Nah, Lazy. The only time I run the thing is when it's *really* cold
and stays cold for a while. Last year it never got cold enough to
bother. The year before we had a really cold January so I used a
bit. Before this year there was no one home from 7:00AM to 7:00PMish
so lighting the thing didn't pay during the week. This year I'm at
home all day and wanted to burn as much of the left over wood as
possible (it's "free").
 
K

krw

Jan 1, 1970
0
krw wrote:


Yeah, and their design engineers seem to have lost the art of power
efficiency. My old Compaq Contura was the last one that I'd consider
efficient. 5-6 hours on a NiCd. The laptop case cracked all around from
too much flying and the battery is dead by now. But if I had my druthers
I'd resurrect it with 10 NiMH AA cells, giving it more capacity than the
old battery ever had. Just imagine, a whole day on one charge, with <$20
worth of AA rechargeables. Seems that "modern" designers can't touch
that anymore :-(

TO be fair, it's not only the power engineers. Even "mobile"
processors suck a lot of power. Large displays and all the other
toys aren't free either. This ThinkPad T60 will go at least three
hours playing a DVD with the screen on maximum brightness. I don't
consider that too bad.

I do like the idea of AA NiCDs though. CHEAP! ...though heavy.
 
J

Joerg

Jan 1, 1970
0
krw said:
TO be fair, it's not only the power engineers. Even "mobile"
processors suck a lot of power. Large displays and all the other
toys aren't free either. This ThinkPad T60 will go at least three
hours playing a DVD with the screen on maximum brightness. I don't
consider that too bad.

I do like the idea of AA NiCDs though. CHEAP! ...though heavy.

Yeah, that's the point: Cheap. Lots of people are talking about a low
cost laptop for the masses and for developing countries. AFAICT all talk
so far. Why don't they realize the obvious? Use nothing but commonly
available mass market parts wherever possible. Who cares about weight
when you can replace the energy source of the laptop for under $20 and,
best of all, buy the replacements at the local supermarket.
 
A

Ancient_Hacker

Jan 1, 1970
0
Learn by first maybe by consulting manufacturers. If makes little
difference to chassis whether fan blows in or out.

[ much more snipped ]


Fella, you're really heavy on the theory, waaay too light on actual
real-world experience.

If you blow air INTO a chassis you have a chance of filtering the air
at the intake

If you blow air OUT of a chassis, every llttle gap, unfilled screw
hole, floppy disk slot, CD drive slot, and poorly sealing cd drive
tray will let in dust.


Again, direction of airflow makes no difference to chassis temperatures.

In theory, maybe. But fans tend to blow air in a particular
direction, but they all suck equally. (ha). So if a fan happens to
blow onto a CPU heatr sink, the heat sink will be substantially cooler
than if the fan just sucked in general.
 
J

Jim Thompson

Jan 1, 1970
0
Learn by first maybe by consulting manufacturers. If makes little
difference to chassis whether fan blows in or out.

[ much more snipped ]


Fella, you're really heavy on the theory, waaay too light on actual
real-world experience.

If you blow air INTO a chassis you have a chance of filtering the air
at the intake

If you blow air OUT of a chassis, every llttle gap, unfilled screw
hole, floppy disk slot, CD drive slot, and poorly sealing cd drive
tray will let in dust.


Again, direction of airflow makes no difference to chassis temperatures.

In theory, maybe. But fans tend to blow air in a particular
direction, but they all suck equally. (ha). So if a fan happens to
blow onto a CPU heatr sink, the heat sink will be substantially cooler
than if the fan just sucked in general.

All fans DON'T "suck equally".

Squirrel cage blowers are much more efficient than conventional
"fans".

...Jim Thompson
 
M

Michael A. Terrell

Jan 1, 1970
0
Jim said:
I wish I knew somebody with a MIG welder.


Me too. All I have is oxy-acetelyene and a crappy little buzz box my
dad used to use.


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida
 
M

Michael A. Terrell

Jan 1, 1970
0
krw said:
Several around here wear shorts in this sort of weather. Some nuts
in the winter, even.


I wear shorts year round, but I'm in Central Florida, and I'm heat
intolerant.


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida
 
M

Michael A. Terrell

Jan 1, 1970
0
Joerg said:
We live in a "Jetson's style" home, early 70's. Open architecture, tons
of windows, not very efficiently heated. It was built in them good old
days where people drove Pontiac GTOs (a neighbor still has his) and
energy prices didn't matter.


My '66 GTO was bright red, had the soft shell doors and ran over 400
HP, yet it gave about 20 MPG while towing a U-Haul trailer at 70+ MPH on
the Interstate from Alabama to Ohio. :) I got better gas mileage with
it than I do out of a beat up '87 Ford Ranger with a 4 cylinder &
automatic, while running empty.

--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida
 
J

Joerg

Jan 1, 1970
0
Michael said:
My '66 GTO was bright red, had the soft shell doors and ran over 400
HP, yet it gave about 20 MPG while towing a U-Haul trailer at 70+ MPH on
the Interstate from Alabama to Ohio. :) I got better gas mileage with
it than I do out of a beat up '87 Ford Ranger with a 4 cylinder &
automatic, while running empty.

Yep, unfortunately the industry doesn't make high compression engines
anymore. I had an Audi (the big one, station wagon) and it gave me 35mpg
if I didn't push it past 80mph and kept it in overdrive. Stick shift, of
course. 10.5:1 compression ratio. With "new and improved" engines you
are lucky to have 8.5:1 and that doesn't allow a good efficiency.

BTW this Audi was still about 25mpg when flooring it and cruising
between 110-115mph. In Germany I could do that for hours on end when I
chose to hit the autobahn while soccer games were on. There were
stretches south of Cologne where I had all three lanes to myself.
 
M

Michael A. Terrell

Jan 1, 1970
0
ehsjr said:
Didn't you know? Dust is a by-product of computing.
Ed


Only if you don't empty the bit bucket every week.


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida
 
J

Jim Yanik

Jan 1, 1970
0
Learn by first maybe by consulting manufacturers. If makes little
difference to chassis whether fan blows in or out.

[ much more snipped ]


Fella, you're really heavy on the theory, waaay too light on actual
real-world experience.

If you blow air INTO a chassis you have a chance of filtering the air
at the intake

If you blow air OUT of a chassis, every llttle gap, unfilled screw
hole, floppy disk slot, CD drive slot, and poorly sealing cd drive
tray will let in dust.


Again, direction of airflow makes no difference to chassis
temperatures.

In theory, maybe. But fans tend to blow air in a particular
direction, but they all suck equally. (ha). So if a fan happens to
blow onto a CPU heatr sink, the heat sink will be substantially cooler
than if the fan just sucked in general.

It sure does matter whether you suck air out or blow it in,as the cases
have been designed with the fans at the TOP of the case,and *heat rises*.
Reverse the airflow,and the lower components will not get the airflow.

Maybe if you took off the left side panel and mounted your filtered fans
near the bottom of it,blowing in,then your intake of dust would stop.
Then you have to contend with filter maintenance.
Filters reduce airflow,and clogged filters even more.

Yeah,there you go;mount a couple of thin 12VDC fans on the lower part of
the case,on the inside,mount two metal channels for a small fiberglass
furnace filter to slide into,on the outside of the case,use a long enough
fan power cable to allow removal of the side panel for accessing the
inside.You still end up with a thin case profile,the filter is easily
accessible for service,too.
Leave the PS fan and the optional case fan to suck out.
There still will be enough overpressure to eliminate intake of dust from
other openings.
Those openings will leak some air out instead.


Consider this my patent on the idea. B-)
 
J

Jim Yanik

Jan 1, 1970
0
Me too. All I have is oxy-acetelyene and a crappy little buzz box my
dad used to use.

I have a Bernz-O-Matic oxy-MAPP gas torch,but it's not appropriate for
aluminum welding.
 
J

Jim Yanik

Jan 1, 1970
0
Yep, unfortunately the industry doesn't make high compression engines
anymore. I had an Audi (the big one, station wagon) and it gave me 35mpg
if I didn't push it past 80mph and kept it in overdrive. Stick shift, of
course. 10.5:1 compression ratio. With "new and improved" engines you
are lucky to have 8.5:1 and that doesn't allow a good efficiency.


IIRC,my Integra GSR is 11:1,uses premium gas. 170HP at an ungodly RPM.
I've only revved it to 8000 RPM a few times.... B-)
 
J

Jim Thompson

Jan 1, 1970
0
Yes, there are some high compression cars left but those are what most
people would place in the hotrod category and where the highway patrol
keeps their radar guns trained onto ;-)

I just wonder why high compression vanished from the mainstream. My Audi
was more of a station wagon for a large family, not at all something
you'd use in racing. Was it a higher level of NOX in the exhaust that
did them in?

Yes.

Although my Q45...

4,494 cc 4.5 liters V 8 front engine with 93 mm bore, 82.7 mm stroke,
10.5 compression ratio, double overhead cam, variable valve
timing/camshaft and four valves per cylinder VK45

19.5MPG at 100MPH ;-)

...Jim Thompson
 
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