Hello,
I just found out about TLP - a module to download with apt, which is a good utility for maintaining the laptop battery. You can set a minimum charge value, and a maximum charge value. But it is not sufficient for my use case. My question is - is there any utility I can use to discharge the battery WHILE connected to AC?
The reason behind this is: I want to use the solar power during the day to charge up the battery to 80 or 90% and then discharge the battery in the evening to 15-20%. Afterwards use AC power again. The solar energy during mid-day is cheaper and available in abundance.
On a big level with many computers this could make a good impact on the energy network, or am I wrong?
I’ve got a 2021 Dell laptop. In uefi, you can set charge times and type of charge, 50%,80%, full, and smart. I think it’s in like 1/2 hour blocks by day. By that I mean on (day of week) from 9:30am to 6:00pm charge full, different day may have different settings. .
@Intheflsun @Floopquist What I meant is that I do not think you can have it discharge the battery when AC is present without altering the PD chips firmware.
Some laptop battery firmware allows you to force discharge even when connected to AC, and if your laptop can use the
tlp recalibrateortlp dischargecommands then yours is supported.I use this to power my thinkpad servers off of their own batteries during a power outage, to reduce load on my UPS. Great feature.
Sounds like a smart socket might do what you need, externally, with some coding.
@Floopquist I don’t think that you can do that without altering the firmware on the PD chip.
