An electronics hobbyist has designed a “laptop computer type issue machine” that’s estimated to run for 2 years between costs. The self-effacingly named PotatoP combines a mixture of low energy elements, plus a 12,000 mAh battery pack and a modest financial institution of photo voltaic cells. Finally, Andreas Eriksen, the PotatoP designer, desires to develop this laptop computer undertaking to supply infinite battery life, plus a much bigger show.
The inspiration for the PotatoP got here from the creator’s annoyance along with his current laptop computer at all times working out of battery. For the “small programming tasks” it was used for, highly effective {hardware} was pointless. It could higher go well with the consumer if the laptop computer design was skewed towards very low energy use, so long as the display was sharp and readable and the keyboard workmanlike.
To execute the above imaginative and prescient, the PotatoP design depends on the SparkFun RedBoard Artemis ATP developer board as its ‘motherboard.’ This foundational element selection options the Ambiq Apollo3 SoC, which is claimed to “set a brand new commonplace in vitality effectivity for battery powered gadgets.” The SoC’s Arm Cortex-M4F runs at as much as 96 MHz whereas consuming lower than six micro-Amps per MHz. The SBC additionally has 384KB RAM and 1MB flash reminiscence, in addition to an intensive number of interfaces / connectivity choices contemplating its dimension.
One other element that was key to the PotatoP as you see it at present is the Sharp Reminiscence in Pixel show LS044Q7DH01. This can be a monochrome 320 x 240 pixels show with a 4.4-inch diagonal. Eriksen says that he needs that Sharp made a much bigger model of this show, and might be open to another so long as it is as thrifty with energy consumption. The show has no backlight, which can assist with energy effectivity. Nevertheless, this 4.4-inch show is claimed to be “surprisingly readable,” in effectively lit situations. Lastly, we should say the diminutive show offers this PotatoP machine a novel fashion.
Whereas there are apparent sacrifices made within the show and processing energy, it is good to see that the PotatoP creator couldn’t abdomen a substandard typing expertise. Thus, he sacrificed an previous Completely satisfied Hacking Keyboard Lite 2 to combine it into the PotatoP.
For software program, the PotatoP is working a Lisp surroundings (uLisp). PotatoP creator Eriksen says that utilizing Lisp to create obligatory software software program is one other a part of the enjoyable of utilizing this do-it-yourself pc.
Lastly, the PotatoP, with its already spectacular battery life already measured in years, is being tuned in order that it could by no means require a charging cable. The creator has been busy engaged on system optimizations to scale back energy consumption, which you’ll examine within the improvement undertaking logs. If software program tweaks alone can’t lengthen the battery life to infinity as issues stand (with the assistance of photo voltaic), Eriksen is pondering over including extra photo voltaic cells to realize this purpose.