[IAEP] [support-gang] Questions About Solar Panels

[Mike Lee]

When Cici (age 6 at the time) and I first encountered the whining sound
from an XO-1.5 powered by a panel, we made electronic music by waving our
hands and toys over the panel. We got a theremin for free!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/curiouslee/5172563580/

Mike

On Fri, Nov 2, 2012 at 1:02 PM, Caryl Bigenho <cbigenho at hotmail.com> wrote:

>  Thanks folks for the info.... now I am wondering... if I were to put the
> solar panel in the *shade* on a bright, sunny day would it work on the
> XO-1? Also, I still would like to know what the high-pitched whining sound
> (guessing it was around 1800cps) was and whether the XO could be damaged? I
> won't try it until I have assurance it won't damage the machine.
>
> Back to the XO-1.75... The sun was really bright yesterday when I was
> experimenting, and the panel was tilted at an angle to catch the full sun.
> XO-1.75 still wouldn't do anything. I really wanted to replicate Richard's
> "show" with the idea of doing it at SCaLE 12X in February. But, then, it is
> usually pretty foggy or rainy near LAX in Feb when they have SCaLE.
>
> Thanks again. More suggestions of fun things to try would be welcome. I
> guess I'm in my "second childhood" (or maybe I never left the first one!)
>
> Caryl (aka GrannieB)
>
>
>
> > To: support-gang at laptop.org
> > From: pgf at laptop.org
> > Date: Fri, 2 Nov 2012 08:30:39 -0400
> > Subject: Re: [support-gang] Questions About Solar Panels
>
> >
> > james wrote:
> > > G'day Caryl,
> > >
> > > Mike is right, some panels are incompatible with an XO-1. They just
> > > won't charge if the sun is too bright.
> > >
> > > To discharge the batteries, one way is to break into the ok prompt, and
> > > leave it on there.
> > >
> > > To answer your questions though,
> > >
> > > On Thu, Nov 01, 2012 at 10:27:31PM -0700, Caryl Bigenho wrote:
> > > > 1) Why the XO-1.75 would not even complete the start up using the
> > > > solar panel with the battery out?
> > >
> > > Because there was insufficient power from the solar panel. You might
> > > fix this by either (a) using a more powerful solar panel, (b) tilting
> > > it toward the sun, or (c) wait for midday sun.
> >
> > and remember, leaving aside richard's starring role in that solar-only
> > 1.75 video last year, the laptops aren't really meant to run on just
> > solar alone -- the battery provides stability, by making up for small
> > dips in solar output from clouds, etc.
> >
> > it _might_ also be the case that you have early hardware -- we paid
> > a lot more attention to solar operation on 1.75 than on the earlier
> > laptops, and some of the charging circuitry might have changed early
> > on. richard will remember.
> >
> > paul
> > =---------------------
> > paul fox, pgf at laptop.org
> > _______________________________________________
> > support-gang mailing list
> > support-gang at lists.laptop.org
> > http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/support-gang
>
> _______________________________________________
> support-gang mailing list
> support-gang at lists.laptop.org
> http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/support-gang
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.sugarlabs.org/archive/iaep/attachments/20121102/b3a5ecd3/attachment.html>