Got a new Sandisk Clip, a very small MP3 player with an FM radio.
Built in battery, recharges from USB. I will probably forget to do this.
Am I correct, about radios in general and probably about this, that 80 or 90% of the power is used in the last stage, the stage that powers the earbuds (or the speakers in a radio) And t hat all the other stages put together use less than 10 or 20% of the power?
Sometimes when listening to the radio and walking around, the sound disappears because the signal is not there. No hum even. Am I right that it's only using 10 or 20% of the power it does when the program is playing?
It probably is the audio stage that uses the most power.
I don't know what the radio in there is, but I suspect it might be one of those software radios, that convert early on to a low frequency and then do the rest digitally. I have a Sansa Fuze, about the same era, and I am quite impressed by the FM radio. But there isn't much space in there for analog components (not when you take away the space for the screen and the battery), so it likely is something fairly digital.
Apparently most smartphones have the ability to tune the FM broadcast band, using similar digital circuitry, but in North America that function is often turned off through software.
They surely design for low current draw, so yes, if nothing is coming out the headphones, there can't be much current draw.
Try it. Charge it up, then leave it running with the headphones plugged in and the volume high. See how long the battery lasts. Recharge it and then do it again with the volume at low. I would think the battery lasts longer with the volume at low.
Yes, me too. I have another Clip somewhere, that I can't find. It had a microphone and the abilitiy to record voices. Could be very useful some time. but that time hasn't happened yet. I don't think it's legal in Maryland without the other party's consent, where I live, but it woudl be some other places.
The new one has no microphone. The tuner seems about the same. Even a pretty strong station, it made a difference where I was standing, even in my wooden house, but it also worked pretty well in a steel frame store.
Because I already had one, it was very hard to buy another, especially new, so I looked on ebay. Ebay still had two auctions from last fall, and the bidding went up to 37 and 38 dollars. The new one a couple days ago was 35 dollars plus tax at a local store (Best Buy) That's with
4Gigs. One of the auction items was only 2 Gigs. Not that I need more than 2, but it still shows how people can bid more than something is worth. (The new ones have a slot for inserting some sort of memory card, in addition to the 4 or 8 gigs they come with.)
Does that make a difference in power consumption?
Yes, I have a phone like that too, a Huawei. I thought it would be good for walking, but it's too heavy afaic and no one calls me when I'm walking and I usually don't have anyone to call.
But it was good when I had outpatient surgery at the hospital last month, and had to spend about 4 hours in bed there afterwards. Listened to the radio (FM only) and when the phone rang and I answered, the radio stopped automatically. Started up again when I hung up.
Well, I'm sure of that but I'll never get around to doing tests. I was interested in people's estimates. If 80 or 90% is too high.
I keep an 11-tube tuner that draws about 60 watts and is fused with a 3/4A dual-element fuse.
Matching to it is a 35 watt (2 x 17.5) 6-tube power-amp that is fused at 1.
5A. It is a Class A/B device.
Yes, the part that moves the air takes most of the power.
Now - digital radios are all/nothing devices. The term is 'cliff effect', t here is no fading, it just drops off the cliff. The power-amp part is proba bly a Class D device. Meaning it only draws power when it is passing signal making it about 90% efficient.
So, at no-signal conditions, the radio section is still drawing 100% of its necessary power, the amp is drawing (very nearly almost) nothing. But, if you are making your ears bleed, the amp section will be drawing much more t han the radio section. Phil's piece of string is an apt analogy.
That's not quite true. Yes, there is a way to know. micky's pattern is pretty obvious; if you didn't know from the first post, the next few hundred should certainly convince you.
Need? Well, that's a judgment call. Sometimes you're less aggravated by stupidity if it isn't a surprise. But avoiding aggravation isn't necessarily a priority for everybody.
Maybe we should all get together and chip so that Jeff U. and Phil A. can m eet.
There is a real potential for an outcome along the lines of the Kilkenny Ca ts:
There once were two cats of Kilkenny, Each thought there was one cat too many, So they fought and they fit, And they scratched and they bit, Till, excepting their nails And the tips of their tails, Instead of two cats, there weren?t any.
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